Maybe a silly question, maybe one without an answer. But I can't seem to find anyone who has actually, you know, described one before.
Here's the setup: I'm getting ready to brew up my next beer (batch #3) tomorrow. It's supposed to be a relatively large one (1.073 OG) and so I threw together a starter last night.
I rattled the starter bottle a bit this morning, and was out and about all day. Just now (about seven or eight hours later) I came home and shook it up again.
Before doing so, however, I noted two, maybe three, very large, very white islands of something floating on top of the starter wort. I have no idea if this is leftovers from fermentation, or is the result of gasses being released, or were a couple clumps of dead yeast cells or what. They almost reminded me of the kind of white mold islands that will grow on watery leftovers left too long in the fridge...
But now I'm curious, because if I did infect my starter, I see very little reason to, you know, actually put it into an otherwise good batch of beer! Sorry that I wasn't bright enough to take pictures first.
Here's the setup: I'm getting ready to brew up my next beer (batch #3) tomorrow. It's supposed to be a relatively large one (1.073 OG) and so I threw together a starter last night.
I rattled the starter bottle a bit this morning, and was out and about all day. Just now (about seven or eight hours later) I came home and shook it up again.
Before doing so, however, I noted two, maybe three, very large, very white islands of something floating on top of the starter wort. I have no idea if this is leftovers from fermentation, or is the result of gasses being released, or were a couple clumps of dead yeast cells or what. They almost reminded me of the kind of white mold islands that will grow on watery leftovers left too long in the fridge...
But now I'm curious, because if I did infect my starter, I see very little reason to, you know, actually put it into an otherwise good batch of beer! Sorry that I wasn't bright enough to take pictures first.