Yeast Washing Illustrated

[Rick500]

The washed yeast sediment is about equal in density to what you'd find in a White Labs vial or Wyeast smack pack.

 

[Droot]

How much YEAST is in a smack pack and how much is nutrient?

I have been wondering about that.

David

 

[Rick500]

Much easier to see in a White Labs vial...if you have one handy, there's about the same amount of yeast in a White Labs vial and a Wyeast smack pack.

 

[ChshreCat]

My wife cleaned out the fridge today.

She didn't know what the "old jar of gunk in the back" was.

MY PACMAN!!!!!!!!!

I'm gonna go cry now.

 

[Rick500]

I wonder if it would have helped or made matters worse had it been labeled "Pacman".

 

[NotALamer]

So what is all the junk that settles to the bottom? I just washed a starter I had been building up for about a week and it had quite a layer of sediment. After shaking it all up and letting it settle there was a lot of stuff at the bottom. It looks a lot like yeast to me, I'm sure I just dumped a bunch down the drain. We'll see how much I end up with after it sits in the fridge over night. I'm planning on decanting off the top tomorrow and doing some cell counts.

 

[ChshreCat]

So what is all the junk that settles to the bottom? I just washed a starter I had been building up for about a week and it had quite a layer of sediment. After shaking it all up and letting it settle there was a lot of stuff at the bottom. It looks a lot like yeast to me, I'm sure I just dumped a bunch down the drain. We'll see how much I end up with after it sits in the fridge over night. I'm planning on decanting off the top tomorrow and doing some cell counts.

At room temp, when you shake it up and let it sit, all the dead stuff sinks to the bottom first. If it's a starter, that's (mostly) dead yeast. If you're washing a yeast cake then it also has hop particles, break material and whatever else might have been in there.

When you put it in the fridge, the live yeast go dormant and sink to the bottom.

 

[NotALamer]

Sounds good, I'm planning on doing a methylene blue stain to check the viability. It should be pretty high since this is a fresh starter from two days ago, and I just washed it. Is 24 hours enough time for all the dormant yeast to settle out? How long does it usually take?

 

[NotALamer]

Still looks pretty cloudy but Palmer said overnight was OK in HTB.

 

[chefchris]

So those of you using a Sun Tea jug (which I will be buying soon) it looks like you are just dumping the water into the fermenter, swirling it then dumping the whole thing into the jug from there. Is that right?

 

[Rick500]

Dump the water into the fermenter, swirl it, let the fermenter settle for 20 minutes, then pour the liquid (but not the sediment) into the sun tea jug, let that settle for 20 minutes, then pour the liquid (but not sediment) from the sun tea jug into the small jars.

 

[chefchris]

Dump the water into the fermenter, swirl it, let the fermenter settle for 20 minutes, then pour the liquid (but not the sediment) into the sun tea jug, let that settle for 20 minutes, then pour the liquid (but not sediment) from the sun tea jug into the small jars.

gotcha, from what I read it looked liked they were skipping a step.

thanks!

 

[Droot]

I'm thinkin I'm hooked.

I have enough yeast for a year.... 14 jars total, 3 different kinds of yeast... I went to 4 oz jars for the space.

 

[Wild Duk]

1 quick question on how much water to use....I am to use enough water to fill 4 mason jars and the extra vessel....Does it matter what size vessel it is.....I'm confused on the fact that the author puts water from a 4 mason jars and the extra container in the carboy....

If your just looking to fill 4 mason jars, wouldn't that be all the water you would need to boil up and put into the carboy....

 

[Droot]

I put as much water as stuff I have collected. If I get 8 oz of beer/yeast, I add 8oz boiled and cooled water and stir. The yeast falls out in an hour or less. I then suck it out with a turkey baster and put it in the small jars. I then top up with boiled and cooled water so there is minimal head space.

I have proffed one sample and it took right off.

Star San was out in full force.

 

[Rick500]

I've been pouring everything off the yeast in the carboy as much as possible, then adding one gallon of boiled/cooled water to the carboy. I end up, after all the settling and decanting steps, with between three and five pint Mason jars.

 

[Buffman]

I'm going to try this with the trub from an APA that's fermenting right now (with Safale 05). I probably won't brew with it for a few months, though as I'm trying a variety of styles and my next few batches call for more specialized yeast. How long will washed yeast keep?

 

[janzik]

I have washed a few batches of yeast, but haven't used any of them yet. As of right now, I only have one batch (I threw out the others because they froze in an out door fridge). Right now I have 5 one pint mason jars of Burton in the fridge and would like to do more, but I really don't want to take up my fridge with pint jars.

I know I can get real kooky with how much I can get involved in with this, but what is my next logical step? Should I order a bunch of glass test tubes and a rack from cynmar? If I'm just looking to keep a supply in fridge and compact the space, is this the route I should go? When should I dump yeast that I've washed and never wind up using? (I can't imagine myself using 5 vials of Burton any time soon when I primarily use WLP001 as my standard liquid yeast).

If I wanted to start a frozen yeast bank, is this where I get all the agar(sp) plates and whatnot?

 

[chefchris]

**** me. I've been searching for days for the sun tea jug. Finally found one 20 minutes across town and picked up an herb ball, too. Get 20 paces from my door and dropped the thing. Shattered everywhere. Cut my fingers up.

****!!!!!

 

[Rick500]

Doh! Hope your fingers didn't suffer too much.

 

[chefchris]

Went back the other night and picked up another jug. I did the turn the carboy on it's side trick and then decanted that into the tea jug. At first I wasn't impressed with the final results, I almost got on here to talk about how much I suck at washing yeast. But after the jars settled in the fridge I saw a lot more yeast had dropped out. Then I got home today and it's really thick. My girlfriend even noticed without me saying anything about it.

So I am here to advocate the turn-carboy-on-side-then-decant-into-tea jug method. Works great.

 

[chefchris]

Alright, I was turning the camera on and off the whole time I was getting a hair cut so I could show off the skillz. Then had to search everywhere to find the camera chord.

Here's my very ****ty photo of my washed Irish Ale yeast using the method mentioned above.

 

[MattHollingsworth]

Did this for the first time this morning. The 3 720 ml jars are now settling. I had 4 jars ready but really needed just the 3. The large jar is 2500 ml, so logical that I'd need just the 3. But I prepped 4 and had them all ready with water and such. Process went well. They're settling in the fridge now and all seems well. They're still cloudy though, so no follow up, settled photos yet.

You can see the brown line in the first photo, which is not a shadow. That's the brown sediment. In the last photo, you can see what was left behind in the large jar. There's a very clear line where the brown sediment is settled there. You can see a tiny amount of white above it in that photo. But the three jars were totally full, so that's that.

And here's after settling in the fridge for four hours. You can see a couple of small floaters at the top of the two right jars. Otherwise, milky goodness settling into layers. The bottom's hard to see, but it's powdery yeast, nice and thick.

 

[Lexvegas]

How do you get the yeast from the carboy into the big Mason Jar? Just pour it?

 

[Rick500]

Yep. Pour just the liquid with the yeast suspended in it. Leave the sediment behind.

 

[Falcor]

Surprised no one has asked this yet (got to page 10 or 12 and didn't see it)...

You put all off the jars in the fridge full of water, even the pint jars. Then later you fill the pint jars from the larger one.... but the pint jars are already full because you left the water from the boil in them. So when do you pour the water out of the pint jars, just before filling? Is this to make sure that no nasties can get into the jar while its cooling because its full of sterilized water?

 

[AnonyBrew]

I believe they all are emptied into the fermenter. So the pint jars are empty too when you fill them with the larger jar.

 

[Falcor]

Ah, I read that post several times and didn't pick up on that part. I see that now but it still doesn't seem right... I end up pouring large jar + 4 pints into the fermenter. Swirl and fill large jar. I'm supposed to have 4 pints left in fermenter when this is done? Seems like I'd be watering down my yeast solution and leaving a bunch in the fermenter.

 

[ChshreCat]

After dumping in the fermenter, if you let it sit for a few minutes the heavier stuff will sink, leaving the yeast up in suspension. the liquid you leave behind is from the bottom so you leave trub and hop particles and dead yeast clumps behind.

 

[Falcor]

All makes sense now. Thanks guys