Should I reculture?

[Skyforger]

I brewed a dubbel a while back. It stayed in primary for about 4 weeks, then I moved into about freezing temps for another three weeks, still on the yeast cake. I'm planning on bottling soon.

Should I depend on the old yeast (it's WLP500) to bottle condition? Or should I pitch in some champagne yeast? Would that change the character much, prevent it from developing complexity in the bottle, dry it out?

It would be possible, I suppose, to wake up some of the yeast from the bottom in a starter. But that would delay my bottling, and be a bit of a hassle. Do you think it would be worth it?

 

[petep1980]

I haven't done it, but I keep nottingham and those little cooper's yeast packages on hand, just in case I'm concerned about having enough at bottling.

There is so little sugar for the bottling yeast to actually it I have a tough time any really contribute (outside of obscure ones) much in the way of flavor.

I would think near freezing would drop a lot out, so def consider some bottling yeast.

 

[Skyforger]

Well, I've got a pack of Safale US-05 as well. Maybe I'll sprinkle a bit of that in, unless someone feels like convincing me otherwise.