Vigorous Fementation!

[Bacchus]

Well, I finally went and did it. I made a yeast starter for my latest batch of beer and I can honestly say that I've never seen a more vigorous fermentation. I pitched the yeast less than twelve hours ago and my airlock isn't just bubbling.....it's boiling! It's like three bubbles per second. I'm now a believer.

The new batch is a Belgian Strong Ale with an SG of 1082 and I aerated for 2 minutes with oxygen and aeration stone. I also threw in 1/2 tsp. of yeast nutrient. The yeast is Wyeast Belgian Abbey II and it was incubated in a starter for 36 hours.

Just wanted to share with people that would appreciate all of the above. Non-homebrewers would give me a blank stare after hearing it. LOL!

 

[Potter1]

Nice


Starters are the way and the light!

 

[robertvrabel]

Awesome! I'm making 2 batches this weekend... and I also created 2 starters yesterday that I'm going to use (first ones I've ever made). Pretty pumped to see the results!

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

Congrats.....

 

[KevinW]

Sweet!
I am too lazy for starters but I just did a stout in which I added yeast nutrient. Quick start and quick finish of the ferment. I like it!

 

[Bacchus]

Thanks for all of the positive responses.

Went out and checked the fementation bucket when I got home from work. What a mess! The krausen had come up through the airlock and blown the cap and bobber(?) out of the lock and there was crusty krausen all over the lid. I cleaned everything up and refilled the airlock. It seems to have calmed down a bit. No longer boiling. Now it's bubbling at about one bubble per second and no sign of krausen coming out any more. The scum ring runs all the way up the side of the bucket and has even grown across the inside of the lid. LOL!!! This is unreal. I'm really anxious to see where the final gravity of this ale ends up.

 

[imperial]

Congrats on the starter. Be careful not to over do it (this is pretty hard to do). I overpitched (according to Mr Malty) a couple batches of beer. They fermented quickly (90% done in 24 hours) and barley hit the low value of the apparent attenuation for my yeast. Basically the yeast went crazy for ~24 hours, then totally pooped out. Now I make a starter, then pitch only what I need (again, according to Mr Malty).

 

[Bacchus]

Congrats on the starter. Be careful not to over do it (this is pretty hard to do). I overpitched (according to Mr Malty) a couple batches of beer. They fermented quickly (90% done in 24 hours) and barley hit the low value of the apparent attenuation for my yeast. Basically the yeast went crazy for ~24 hours, then totally pooped out. Now I make a starter, then pitch only what I need (again, according to Mr Malty).

Thanks for the pointer. I'll try and keep that in mind in the future.

 

[Bacchus]

Hey there, Imperial....just did some web surfing to look up "overpitching yeast" and it seems to be quite a controversial theory. Most of what I read said, "Bah, humbug!" to the whole idea of overpitching and that it was impossible to pitch too much yeast. A few others said it was an obsolute fact and a serious concern. I sometimes think that beer brewing is made more complicated than it needs to be and we wind up regarding other brewer's opinions as fact. LOL!!

I suppose the ultimate litmus test will be how good or bad the finished product tastes, huh?

Thanks again!

 

[imperial]

I used to believe that it was impossible to overpitch. Now I believe that it definitely is possible. Here's the thing, if Mr Malty says to pitch 160ml thick yeast slurry, and you pitch 240ml thick yeast slurry, there is a chance that you have overpitched. I have seen this in my own brewing. When I overpitch by 50% (for example) my ferment is fast and furious, then it stops too early (I'm at the low end of the specified AA for my yeast). When I pitch right on (according to Mr Malty), my AA is well past the specified AA for my yeast (this is another problem in itself). There was a great link that I found on this site that talked about overpitching. I can't find it right now, but there were two main things, IIRC:
* overpitching can reduce the amount of ester and phenol production (this may or may not be good)
* overpitching can cause a ferment to quit too early because the yeast calculate whether the beer can support all of them. If it can't, then stop working. If there are more yeast, it will be harder for the beer to support all of them (this is totally paraphrased and psuedo-sciency)
* It's good to get some new yeast generations in your ferment. If you pitch too much yeast, the yeast will not need to reproduce (I think this is related to the esters and phenols)

All that said, I would not worry about overpitching until you think you've done so.

 

[Bacchus]

It's almost 72 hours into fermentation and SG has dropped from 1082 to 1028 and the airlock is still clicking along at six bubbles per minute. I figure that by tomorrow evening activity will drop to almost nothing.

 

[r_flagg]

I've only done 4 batches so far, but I've done yeast starters for the last 3. The last one I did, I used the leftover priming sugar from the previous batches to boil. I also added yeast nutrient and boiled for 15 minutes. I'm not sure if that was correct or not, because the yeast didn't really seem to take off (even after 24 hours) until I added it to the primary.

#1 I'm not sure that priming sugar was the right thing to use. The 1st time I used table sugar and it worked great. The second time I used DME and that worked even better. Not so great with priming sugar though! I think I'll stick to DME in the future.

#2 I've read that you should add the yeast nutrient to the wort during the last 15 minutes of the boil. I thought I would combine that into the yeast starter boil, but apparently that's not the greatest idea because the yeast nutrient just settled to the bottom. I figured since it's top-fermenting yeast, the nutrient sitting at the bottom was probably not doing anything for it. I'll add it to the boil next time and see if it is still settling out.

Those are my thoughts. Does anyone have any comments on this?

 

[PorterIV]

I would definitely recommend only using DME. Apparently if you use corn sugar or table sugar (sucrose) in your starter your yeast adapt to that type of sugar to the detriment of maltose (sugar in malt). That doesn't jive with your first starter - maybe you got lucky. As to nutrients, I haven't ever used them as my tap water has most of the nutrients a yeast needs. Also White Labs comes with some. Just a place I save money - though I do make sure to aerate my wort with pure O2.

 

[bionicbrew]

sugar of any kind is not really good for a starter. DME is the best. read the Mr. Malty site. there is some great info there. IIRC, yeast in a sugar based starter stop making the enzymes they need to breakdown the larger maltose and other sugars found in Wort. they basically get lazy.

on the overpitching thoughts- I believe I overpitched a hefe by putting a batch on the yeast cake of the hefe before it. there was a definite difference in the flavor of the second one. not nearly as good as the first, although still good beer and anyone who tasted the second one only, liked it just fine. this is anecdotal, of course, so take it with a grain of salt.