Spilled yeast while pitching

[blittle]

Making a SNPA clone and pitched my yeast last night. It was the liquid yeast. I left it out maybe 4 hours on the counter and then shook it pretty good. When I opened the container to pitch it, it was under pressure like a soft drink bottle when you shake and I'd guess half of it spilled out. I pitched what was remaining and today it's starting to show signs of fermentation. Here's my dumb question. Do I need to add additional yeast, or will what I pitched get the job done? I believe the yeast used was White Labs WLP001

 

[Revvy]

Happens to all of us.

You should have made a starter though. Even spilling it would have left you the opportunity for the yeast to reproduce.

If using liquid yeast you should make a starter for every beer with a gravity above 1.030.

Making starters regardless of the size ensures viability and plenty of yeast.

 

[beninan]

Did you happen to make a starter with the vial of yeast, and pitch the starter? Or did you only pour in the one vial directly into the beer? How big is the batch of beer? What was the original gravity?

Liquid yeast vials do not have the required amount of yeast to be properly pitched into an average gravity beer at 5 gallons. This is why a starter should always be performed when using a vial of liquid yeast. Pitching just the vial can be done however, but 1 vial of liquid yeast is under-pitching, and you may be risking some ill effects from under-pitching.

You could just let it go and see what happens. It you want to pitch more yeast, I would suggest buying a packet of Safale US-05. WLP001 and US-05 are the same strain of yeast. US-05 is cheaper than WLP001 and it can be pitched without a starter.

 

[blittle]

It's a 5 gallon batch. I'm a newbie, and didn't realize I needed to make a starter. My LHBS dude said I just needed to dump it in, but I could have misunderstood. Next time I'll make a starter. It's fermenting - maybe 1/2 inch of krausen after about 24 hours. So should I let it go, or pitch more yeast? If I pitch more yeast, it wouldn't be until Tuesday night (day 3).

 

[frazier]

Let it go. It sounds like it's fermenting fine, probably got off to a slow start due to underpitching. It will be what it will be. Enjoy it!

 

[Ferminator]

Let it ride.

 

[blittle]

Perfect. Thanks. I'll let this one go and chalk it up to a learning experience.