To Slant or Not to Slant?

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Iniquity

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Recently I have been thinking about slanting my yeast and making a collection from each one of my brews I make. However, I know that the shelf life of the slants are not particularly long, I hear thing like 3 months to a year.

My question is whether or not it would be practical for me to go through the process of slanting the yeast if I never really have the time to get around to using it. Especially if I plan on brewing different styles and will probably not use the same yeast at the very least a few months from each other.

Does anyone have any suggestions on this?

Are there other options?

How long does a slant tube last before having to add yeast to it?
 
Bobby M recently did a test on year old store yeast here; https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/testing-limits-yeast-viability-126707/

And my LHBS cells outdated tubes and packs of yeast dirt cheap 2-3 dollars each and I usually grab a couple tubes of belgian or other interesting yeast when I am there and shove it in my fridge. and I have never had a problem with one of those tubes. I usually make a starter but I once pitched a year old tube of Belgian High Gravity yeast directly into a 2.5 gallon batch of a Belgian Dark Strong, and after about 4 days it took off beautifully.

I don't know if you know the story of Charlie Papazian's yeast (White Labs "Cry Havoc") or not. He talked about it on basic brewing. The recipes in both Papazian's books, The Complete Joy of Homebrewing and The Homebrewers Companion, were originally developed and brewed with this yeast. Papazian had "Cry Havoc" in his yeast stable since 1983.

He has used it nearly continuously since 83, sometimes pitching multiple batches on top of a cake, sometimes washing or not washing, etc. In a basic brewing podcast iirc last year he talked about how a batch of the yeast after a lot of uses picked up a wild mutation, and he noticed an off flavor in a couple batches.

Now most of us would prolly dump that yeast. Instead he washed it, slanted or jarred it (I can't recall which,)marked it, and cold stored it, and pretty much forgot about it for 10-15 years. He had plenty other slants of the yeast strain, so he left it alone.

Well evidently he came across that container of yeast, and for sh!ts and giggles made a beer with it. Evidently after all those years in storage, the wild or mutated yeast died out leaving behind a few viable cells of the "pure" culture, which he grew back into a pretty hardy strain...which iirc is the culture that White Labs actually used for their cry havoc...because of it's tenacity and survivability.

It really to me, just goes to show once again how really hard it is to f up this beermaking, and that to give the yeast the props they deserve.

If you slant and freeze them, or if you jar them and store them, as long as you make a starter, and provide a sniff test, to catch those rare times, you will be fine.
 
Bobby M recently did a test on year old store yeast here; https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/testing-limits-yeast-viability-126707/

And my LHBS cells outdated tubes and packs of yeast dirt cheap 2-3 dollars each and I usually grab a couple tubes of belgian or other interesting yeast when I am there and shove it in my fridge. and I have never had a problem with one of those tubes. I usually make a starter but I once pitched a year old tube of Belgian High Gravity yeast directly into a 2.5 gallon batch of a Belgian Dark Strong, and after about 4 days it took off beautifully.

I don't know if you know the story of Charlie Papazian's yeast (White Labs "Cry Havoc") or not. He talked about it on basic brewing. The recipes in both Papazian's books, The Complete Joy of Homebrewing and The Homebrewers Companion, were originally developed and brewed with this yeast. Papazian had "Cry Havoc" in his yeast stable since 1983.

He has used it nearly continuously since 83, sometimes pitching multiple batches on top of a cake, sometimes washing or not washing, etc. In a basic brewing podcast iirc last year he talked about how a batch of the yeast after a lot of uses picked up a wild mutation, and he noticed an off flavor in a couple batches.

Now most of us would prolly dump that yeast. Instead he washed it, slanted or jarred it (I can't recall which,)marked it, and cold stored it, and pretty much forgot about it for 10-15 years. He had plenty other slants of the yeast strain, so he left it alone.

Well evidently he came across that container of yeast, and for sh!ts and giggles made a beer with it. Evidently after all those years in storage, the wild or mutated yeast died out leaving behind a few viable cells of the "pure" culture, which he grew back into a pretty hardy strain...which iirc is the culture that White Labs actually used for their cry havoc...because of it's tenacity and survivability.

It really to me, just goes to show once again how really hard it is to f up this beermaking, and that to give the yeast the props they deserve.

If you slant and freeze them, or if you jar them and store them, as long as you make a starter, and provide a sniff test, to catch those rare times, you will be fine.

Much much thanks for your input. This just re-confirms my need to read this book. It is on my Christmas wish list so hopefully the wife comes through.
 
Last January I bought 7 tubes of different yeasts and made slants from each one. Now, almost a year later I'm still using these slants, though I'm almost out of them and will culture the last ones to make new slants.
 
Last January I bought 7 tubes of different yeasts and made slants from each one. Now, almost a year later I'm still using these slants, though I'm almost out of them and will culture the last ones to make new slants.

Are these refrigerated and not frozen?
 
Does anyone have any suggestions on this?

Are there other options?

If you read the sticky, I described a process of saving only about 0.5-1.0 ml of glycerol/yeast slurry and building up from that store. (you will have to build up in steps)

If you keep it well frozen it will basically last indefinitely. This is how yeast is stored in biological research environments (although they store it at temps like -80 C)

Longer lasting but more work to build up the yeast to a pitchable volume. It's a trade-off.
 
I would say overall it's the desire that makes it practical. I was all into slanting at one time and never really thought about if it was practical. Here it is 15 years later and ponder for a moment when I see my empty vials sitting in the cabinet. Then I shut the door and say "maybe again one day".
 
Yeast slants will keep for 12-18 months after which you should re-slant by dipping a sterile wire in the slant vial and then inoculating new slants with it. Frozen yeast vials will keep about twice as long, 2-3 years at home freezer temps. You can't easily re-culture frozen yeast; if you want to propagate it you have to make a starter and then freeze the propagated yeast. That is a lot more trouble than re-slanting yeast, and is more susceptible to contamination.

Note that a slant stored for more than two years will still have enough live yeast you can reculture it; while you can still use it by plating or re-slanting, it just doesn't have enough viable cells to directly inoculate a starter.

My primary motivation for slanting is to keep strains that are hard to find in my library, for example strains cultured from commercial beers or special release strains.
 
Yeast slants will keep for 12-18 months after which you should re-slant by dipping a sterile wire in the slant vial and then inoculating new slants with it. Frozen yeast vials will keep about twice as long, 2-3 years at home freezer temps. You can't easily re-culture frozen yeast; if you want to propagate it you have to make a starter and then freeze the propagated yeast. That is a lot more trouble than re-slanting yeast, and is more susceptible to contamination.

Note that a slant stored for more than two years will still have enough live yeast you can reculture it; while you can still use it by plating or re-slanting, it just doesn't have enough viable cells to directly inoculate a starter.

My primary motivation for slanting is to keep strains that are hard to find in my library, for example strains cultured from commercial beers or special release strains.

Got any Fat Tire? I've read that that yeast was available at one time but no more.
 
Frozen yeast vials will keep about twice as long, 2-3 years at home freezer temps. You can't easily re-culture frozen yeast; if you want to propagate it you have to make a starter and then freeze the propagated yeast.

I don't follow your assertion here...

Are you claiming that yeast frozen with only yeast/glycerol will only keep in a home fridge (with some due care to shield from normal freezer fluctuations) for just 2-3 years?

My understanding (from SWMBO) is I can keep a single vial nearly indefinitely and simply scrape off some cells into a small starter and build it up from there.

I guess I am going to have to stop "talking" about it and get down to bidness here. :)
 
If you slant and freeze them, or if you jar them and store them, as long as you make a starter, and provide a sniff test, to catch those rare times, you will be fine.

Hey Rev...what exactly are you sniffing for in the sniff test? Just anything that smells like something besides yeast? All the common contaminates?

I give my starters a sniff, but am not sure what I am looking for. They all smell 'yeasty' to me. :drunk:
 
Hey Rev...what exactly are you sniffing for in the sniff test? Just anything that smells like something besides yeast? All the common contaminates?

I give my starters a sniff, but am not sure what I am looking for. They all smell 'yeasty' to me. :drunk:

Gorilla poop wrapped in a diaper and left on the side of the road in the desert.

You'd know it if you smelled it. :D
 
My primary motivation for slanting is to keep strains that are hard to find in my library, for example strains cultured from commercial beers or special release strains.

This was my primary motivation for freezing, but then I've also started freezing strains I use quite a bit for the cost savings.

Got any Fat Tire? I've read that that yeast was available at one time but no more.

The Fat Tire yeast was available 4th quarter of 2007, I've got some in my yeast bank. After two years, I have a couple of vials I cultured in Jan 08, but they're starting to look a bit ragged. Time to reculture, I think.
 
If you read the sticky, I described a process of saving only about 0.5-1.0 ml of glycerol/yeast slurry and building up from that store. (you will have to build up in steps)

If you keep it well frozen it will basically last indefinitely. This is how yeast is stored in biological research environments (although they store it at temps like -80 C)

Longer lasting but more work to build up the yeast to a pitchable volume. It's a trade-off.

The vials I freeze my yeast in are more like 20ml, so I directly innoculate a starter with that, it's always turned out fine and i don't need to step it up.
 
My understanding (from SWMBO) is I can keep a single vial nearly indefinitely and simply scrape off some cells into a small starter and build it up from there.

I guess I am going to have to stop "talking" about it and get down to bidness here. :)

I thought I already covered this above... there is a difference between going from a slant/vial of yeast directly to a starter, versus building up a slant or plate to culture the yeast. The recommendations are based on going directly into a starter from a slant/vial. If the yeast is older than that, you should reculture it on a slant or plate, and then pitch that into a starter, to avoid risk of contamination taking over in the starter.

Simply put, it's a numbers game... if I have only a few million viable yeast cells left, and I pitch that into a big starter, it will take so many generations to reach active fermentation that any bacterial or wild yeast contamination will be able to get a foothold. Culturing media such as maltose agar which are autoclaved are a lot less susceptible to contamination than a wort starter which is not sterile.
 
The vials I freeze my yeast in are more like 20ml, so I directly innoculate a starter with that, it's always turned out fine and i don't need to step it up.

But you use the entire vial (which is fine, just a choice). The method I described (in theory at home but in practice in a lab) allows you to save a single strain in a single vial indefinitely.
 
I thought I already covered this above... there is a difference between going from a slant/vial of yeast directly to a starter, versus building up a slant or plate to culture the yeast.

The recommendations are based on going directly into a starter from a slant/vial. If the yeast is older than that, you should reculture it on a slant or plate, and then pitch that into a starter, to avoid risk of contamination taking over in the starter.

Yes, of course there is a difference, but I am discussing scraping some frozen cells into a very small initial starter (as is done in SWMBO's lab). This provides the base to step it back up in a couple of steps to a full size starter (as it would apply to brewing). I was not talking about going from frozen cells to a 2L starter by any means. I don't think I was contradicting anything you said.

I also don't see the justification to go to a plate/vial from frozen stock vs a very small starter unless you are worried about infection/mutation in your stock.
 
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