racking onto yeast cake?
- Thread starter mux
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
kbuzz
Well-Known Member
Yes, still aerate. No matter how many cells you have, they still need oxygen to thrive.
bigbadgreen
Active Member
- Joined
- May 26, 2008
- Messages
- 25
- Reaction score
- 3
I don't do it all the time but I have racked onto a yeast cake a few times as experimental type brews. the last time was this past fall. I brewed a strong scottish ale and then racked some cider on top of the yeast cake just to see how it would go. The cider turned out pretty dry and had a full fermentation. I'd have to look up my notes to get specific gravities. I don't have an aeration system of any sort yet but i did agitate quite well with a couple of gallons in the carboy. I would aerate though if you have the capability. I did start with a pretty large starter because I had planned to do a 2 for 1 so to speak. I love doing this as it keep s cost down and can add subtle flavor variations to your normal brews.
I have a few jars of washed yeast in the fridge, I could use those if need be. I wanted to try this as as an experiment. Ill let you know how it turns out. The cake is a 2 week old wlp001 that cam from a 1200ml starter. It fermented a rye pale ale.
Def. aerate, pure 02 is even better. I don't rack onto cakes (except to attemp to fix a stuck ferment, which has only happened once).
What I like to do, depending on the OG of the new beer, is scoop out a measured amount of slurry (using mr.malty.com) and then pitch THAT directly into the new wort in a clean and sanitized fermentor. If the new beer has a massive OG, then its possible you may need the whole cake anyway, which would negate scooping any slurry out. I use a sanitized mason jar to scoop out the slurry and measure because the mason jar has ml marks. Super easy and allows you to pitch the proper amount of cells.
What I like to do, depending on the OG of the new beer, is scoop out a measured amount of slurry (using mr.malty.com) and then pitch THAT directly into the new wort in a clean and sanitized fermentor. If the new beer has a massive OG, then its possible you may need the whole cake anyway, which would negate scooping any slurry out. I use a sanitized mason jar to scoop out the slurry and measure because the mason jar has ml marks. Super easy and allows you to pitch the proper amount of cells.
Similar threads
