sufficient yeast from harvest starter?

[SGTSparty]

Hey all,
Based on some answers this weekend I'm worried I wont have enough yeast to pitch into my Bell's Two Hearted Clone. I harvested the yeast from 4 bottles and did a step up starter but the instructions I followed apparently had the starter gravity WAY too high (1L water 8 oz DME) so after like a 6 days on the stir plate and 36 hours cold crashing this is what I ended up with in my 2L flask. Does this look like enough for a 5 gallon AG batch of IPA?

Advice appreciated. Also pertinent I have to brew today as its my only day off for 3 weeks and I need this batch ready by the 12th which is already cutting it close w/ the dry hopping. Meaning if I need to run the the LHBS for yeast I need to do it ASAP.

Thanks All

 

[troglodytes]

I'm right there with you. I almost exclusively brew from stepped up staters whether it be from my yeast bank or a commercial bottles and every time I have a starter that looks like yours, I'm mentally comparing it to a vial of WL yeast (which is only 100B cells) and think I'm severely underpitching.

What has set my mind at ease and worked out to create amazing fermentations with no off flavors is Brulosopher's "Vitality Starter" method, but you'll need a stir plate to do it. If you're brewing today you can both slightly step up the yeast in that pic and ensure that those cells are all actively gung ho the second they hit your wort.

Brew as normal, and as your wort just comes to boil (now its sanitized) draw off about 1-1.5L and cool as quickly and sanitary as possible. Pitch it onto your yeast in the pic (see if you can decant a little more if you want) and stick it on your stir plate while you finish your brew day and clean. I generally see activity in about 3 hours and its really starting to off gas at about 4 hours (near krausen), at which point I pitch into my cooled and aerated wort. I've had main fermentations start as soon as 6 hours later but 8 is typical and they are really clean clean, fast, and generally complete (if I'm not a dunce and accidentally chill the yeast outside their comfort range).

At least this method has put my mind at ease as far as pitching rates go.

 

[jjw5015]

^this this is how I rehydrate if I am using something like US-05 and it's already ferment by the time i'm ready to pitch

 

[SGTSparty]

I'm right there with you. I almost exclusively brew from stepped up staters whether it be from my yeast bank or a commercial bottles and every time I have a starter that looks like yours, I'm mentally comparing it to a vial of WL yeast (which is only 100B cells) and think I'm severely underpitching.

What has set my mind at ease and worked out to create amazing fermentations with no off flavors is Brulosopher's "Vitality Starter" method, but you'll need a stir plate to do it. If you're brewing today you can both slightly step up the yeast in that pic and ensure that those cells are all actively gung ho the second they hit your wort.

Brew as normal, and as your wort just comes to boil (now its sanitized) draw off about 1-1.5L and cool as quickly and sanitary as possible. Pitch it onto your yeast in the pic (see if you can decant a little more if you want) and stick it on your stir plate while you finish your brew day and clean. I generally see activity in about 3 hours and its really starting to off gas at about 4 hours (near krausen), at which point I pitch into my cooled and aerated wort. I've had main fermentations start as soon as 6 hours later but 8 is typical and they are really clean clean, fast, and generally complete (if I'm not a dunce and accidentally chill the yeast outside their comfort range).

At least this method has put my mind at ease as far as pitching rates go.

Cool. I pulled off 4 cups of wort in a sanitized measuring cup, covered with sanitized foil and plopped it in the freezer. i was already like 30 min into the boil before I saw this but I figure I'll just pop the lid and pitch after its been on the stir plate for a few hours. As long as I sanitize the hell out of everything that should be OK right?

 

[troglodytes]

Should be fine. If you want to let the vitality starter go for a little bit longer just to get it really going, you won't hurt anything by letting your cool wort sit in the carboy for a couple hours prior to pitching. I like like to let it sit in my basement for a couple hours to get down to 62F gradually after chilling from boiling to about 68-70 depending on groundwater temp. So that gives my vitality starter just about 4 hours on the stir plate when I pitch it.