to decant or not to decant...

[hadabar]

I've made about half a dozen starters....never decanted and have had great success...

while browsing around over the last couple months I notice when people mention pitching their starter...they make a point to tell them to decant.

is there anything to back this up?

pros and cons of both? just curious...

 

[kpr121]

Since you arent exactly worried about making good tasting wort for a starter (oxidized, not hopped, fermented at higher temperature, etc), some people don't like to dump that into their batch of beer.

For me, I just dump it all in. But if I were trying to make a super crisp, clean lager; and made a 2-4 liter starter, I would think about decanting most of the liquid off first.

 

[Revvy]

It's really up to you, some decant, or some just swirl it all in. It like so many things is really a matter of choice, more than anything else.

One factor to consider is whether or not the "starter beer," the liguid on top smells sour or not. Often, especially in the summer it may sour in only a few hours. Some folks add a hop pellet as a preservative/preventative measure. The couple of ounces of sour beer wont really affect the taste of your finished product (unless maybe you were brewing an extremely light tasting beer.) It's really up to you.

Another factor is whether or not the yeast is a low flocculating yeast and there may be a lot still in suspension. The "beer" will be cloudy rather than clear-ish. If it's a witbier or hefe yeast for example it might be better just to swirl and pour it all in, you'll get the max number of yeast cells that way.

My starter flask is huge and often I will build up a starter over a few days and end up with 1 1/2 to 2 quarts of "beer" in it. If the yeast has pretty much flocculated I will, if I have time cold crash it, but even if I don't I will carefully pour off all but about 2 cups of the liquid, then swirl the remainder to re-suspend the yeast and dump it in my fermenter.

 

[binkman]

If you don't decant, you're effectively watering down your brew with whatever your starter is. Personally, making 5 gallon batches, I decant. I can't see how not decanting wouldnt take away from the beer I'm trying to produce. If your starter was basically the same as the wort your pitching into, there's no reason to decant at all.

By decanting, your losing any yeast in suspension, which won't be many, assuming you cold crash your starter and all the yeast drops out to the bottom anyway. Just leave a little liquid, shake it up into a slurry and pitch.

Would you want to pitch a half-gallon pale malt starter into your carefully reconstructed historical porter? I wouldn't. But pitching a half gallon of pale malt starter into a pale ale would have less of an overall effect on the final product.

IMHO, decanting leads to better beer by giving you that much more control over the final product.

But to each his own.

 

[hadabar]

It's really up to you, some decant, or some just swirl it all in. It like so many things is really a matter of choice, more than anything else.

One factor to consider is whether or not the "starter beer," the liguid on top smells sour or not. Often, especially in the summer it may sour in only a few hours. Some folks add a hop pellet as a preservative/preventative measure. The couple of ounces of sour beer wont really affect the taste of your finished product (unless maybe you were brewing an extremely light tasting beer.) It's really up to you.

Another factor is whether or not the yeast is a low flocculating yeast and there may be a lot still in suspension. The "beer" will be cloudy rather than clear-ish. If it's a witbier or hefe yeast for example it might be better just to swirl and pour it all in, you'll get the max number of yeast cells that way.

My starter flask is huge and often I will build up a starter over a few days and end up with 1 1/2 to 2 quarts of "beer" in it. If the yeast has pretty much flocculated I will, if I have time cold crash it, but even if I don't I will carefully pour off all but about 2 cups of the liquid, then swirl the remainder to re-suspend the yeast and dump it in my fermenter.

yeh...I just brewed a saison they other day and I was not going to decant the starter...too many hanging out...but I definitely could of decanted the batch of 007... its like a brick

 

[Revvy]

If you don't decant, you're effectively watering down your brew with whatever your starter is.

No you're not..you're actually adding a small amount of beer to your fermenter.

 

[jtejedor]

If its a 2 liter start I swirl and pitch everything. If its over that I will usually crash it for at least a few days to get as much yeast to floc out as I can. I used to decant even the 2 liter starters but after having some issues I just pitch all of it, does not effect flavor as far as I can tell.

 

[hadabar]

If its a 2 liter start I swirl and pitch everything. If its over that I will usually crash it for at least a few days to get as much yeast to floc out as I can. I used to decant even the 2 liter starters but after having some issues I just pitch all of it, does not effect flavor as far as I can tell.

yeh...I'm only doing 1 liter starters....so shouldn't have a huge effect....I've had less lag time not decanting...

 

[binkman]

No you're not..you're actually adding a small amount of beer to your fermenter.

Well, yes, what I meant was that you are muddling the character of your beer with the starter.

 

[caiafa]

From what I've read it's better to let the yeast flocculate because that means the yeast has made some nutrients reserves and it's going into sleep mode. Pitching actively fermenting yeast in a wort with totally different characteristics (let's say 1.080 vs 1.035) might stress the yeast.

 

[ayoungrad]

Keep in mind the type of beer you are making. If you are making a yeasty hefe (which has suspended yeast even after it has been chilled) you may not want to decant. Yeast for these beers have low levels of flocculation. If you decant, not only would you lose quite a large number of viable yeast cells, but you would also be selectively using the more flocculant cells from the strain.

 

[osagedr]

I've generally pitched ale starters at high krausen when they are in the couple-of-litres range.

I'm going to decant my 4.5 litre lager starter that will be pitched into a Schwarzbier tomorrow. It fermented out and is cold crashing now. Looks like the yeast is dropping out really nicely.

 

[caiafa]

ayoungrad has a point there. I don't brew a lot of hefes so haven't taken that into consideration.

 

[Revvy]

Well, yes, what I meant was that you are muddling the character of your beer with the starter.

If you're using extralight dme in your starters, which you're should be doing, it's really not a big deal. It's a tiny amount of starter/beer into what amounts to being 5 or more gallons of liquid. Unless you're making a bud light clone and making a starter with extra dark dme, and your starter looks like a stout, or you've made a 1 gallon starter, you're not going to notice, and it's not going to affect the character of your beer as much as you may have read.....

 

[RDWHAHB]

If you're using extralight dme in your starters, which you're should be doing...

I usually use frozen extra runnings/wort from all kinds of beers. Why is it that you claim I should use extra light dme? I could switch to extra light dme.

 

[Revvy]

I usually use frozen extra runnings/wort from all kinds of beers. Why is it that you claim I should use extra light dme? I could switch to extra light dme.

So your starter beer WON'T affect the flavor of your beer if you choose not to decant it.

But if you're not noticing any issues with adding your starter "beer" to your wort then you've proven it's not an issue.

 

[RDWHAHB]

So it is a, "you should use extra light DME if you don't decant"?

The reason I ask is the I haven't proved anything, and I've done all sorts of sloppy things in the past I didn't know had a bad affect on my beer. When I see a respected brewer such as yourself say you shouldn't do something I've learned perk up.