Starter Help!

brew2enjoy · Dec 7, 2010

I plan on making a starter for my next batch (DFH 60 min IPA clone). OG should be around 1.070. I am using Wyeast pacman yeast (smack pack). As I read up on starters, I am finding that there are 1001 ways to do it and honestly I am quite confused. According to mrmalty.com I need about a 1.8 liter starter. That seems pretty large to me but thats what it says. Being that the starter is pretty large, should I start it a few days before fermentation and then put it in the fridge for a couple days so I can drain all the excess wort off the top? Since I am making a starter, is it necessary to "smack" the pack and wait for it to swell or can I just smack it to release the nutrients and pitch into my starter?

Here is what I came up with for my starter schedule, I plan to brew next Sunday.

-make starter on Thursday, let it do its thing until Saturday morning
-Saturday put starter in the fridge to cold crash
-Sunday get starter out of fridge and pour off excess wort, let yeast come to room temp & pitch

Does this sound about right? Am I forgetting anything? If something looks out of wack let me know. Thanks!

BuzzCraft · Dec 7, 2010

Starter volume looks fine. Smack or don't smack...I don't know that it matters if you're making a starter, but I don't use Wyeast.

If you want to cold crash you need to make sure it's fermented out completely and the yeast are starting to drop out...if starter fermentation is still active, you'll have a hard time getting them to drop in the fridge. I find that 24 hours is often not long enough....the slow flocculating yeast will still be in suspension and you want them to work over your wort. Give it 48 hrs in the fridge to be safe....there's no downside. If you're going to warm up to pitching temp, make sure you decant first. You could alternatively pitch the yeast cold...your call.

If you get to brewday and for some reason you still have a lot of yeast in suspension (i.e. starter took a while to get going, etc.), don't fret and just pitch the whole thing. There are 1001 ways to do it, cause most of them work!

jmo88 · Dec 7, 2010

Don't forget to shake it as much as you can between Thursday and Saturday. You need to aerate it. This is why many have stir plates.

brew2enjoy · Dec 7, 2010

So it sounds like maybe I should make the starter a little earlier like tomorrow. That would give it more time.

brew2enjoy · Dec 8, 2010

Well I decided to make the starter last night to ensure it had enough time to do its thing. Good thing I checked the gravity because it came out a little on the high side (1.050-1.055), I just added a little bit of filtered water to bring it down to 1.030-ish. I'll let it go for a few days shaking whenever I get the chance. It will go into the fridge friday so it will have 2 full days to cold crash.

Anubis · Dec 8, 2010

Sounds like a good plan. I do pretty much the same thing. After 36 hrs on my stirplate put in in the fridge for 24hrs, decant, let it warm to room temp while I mash and boil.