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Yeast Washing Video

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Billy GREAT videos & links help (Mr Malty's)

Thank you very much. This thread got put into my favorites. And please let us know when you do more videos.

BTW I vote for sticky
 
Great vid.. thank you so much.

I think I will give it a go.. I just kegged a brew that I am not happy with.

I was concerned with the notty I got. The lag time didn't make me happy.

One side of me wants to wash that and see what happens, the other side says dump it.

Either way, thank you for your time, I appreciate it.
 
Reposting here because it's turning out to be harder to get an answer than I anticipated :)
2u7uewx.jpg

This is my first attempt at washing yeast. I followed the directions in the OP of the yeast washing thread, and this is a jar of WLP500 after a day or so of refrigeration. Does it look like I got too much trub/sick yeast when transferring from the fermenter to the flask then the flask to the jar, or am I being paranoid?
 
Hey everyone thanks for the recent compliments and I'm glad the video is helping people. I'm waiting to get an angry call from White Labs because of all the people reusing their yeast lol.

Reposting here because it's turning out to be harder to get an answer than I anticipated :)
2u7uewx.jpg

This is my first attempt at washing yeast. I followed the directions in the OP of the yeast washing thread, and this is a jar of WLP500 after a day or so of refrigeration. Does it look like I got too much trub/sick yeast when transferring from the fermenter to the flask then the flask to the jar, or am I being paranoid?

It looks like you got a little more trub there then is desirable but that's still a great big band of yeast. You could always wash it again if you're worried about it, or when you go to make a starter just try to leave the trub behind when you pour out the yeast. You'll be fine.
 
Besides that, you might not have waited long enough. On the flip side you could have waited too long. Eventually everything will mush back together like it did in your carboy. You just gotta strike when the time is right - which you can tell visually.

Billy, just quoting you from earlier in the thread because this feedback helped me so much. I was having a heck of a time with trub my first few attempts.

For me the timing was key, waiting maybe 20-30 mins...

The last few batches I did were 100% trub-less, just a nice layer of healthy yeast in every starter.

This saves me hundreds of dollars a year. Great post.

PS-The starters with the trub in them are just as usable, I've fermented out all my trubb-y ones and the beer's just fine!
 
It looks like you got a little more trub there then is desirable but that's still a great big band of yeast. You could always wash it again if you're worried about it, or when you go to make a starter just try to leave the trub behind when you pour out the yeast. You'll be fine.

Thanks for the help :)
 
Hey everyone thanks for the recent compliments and I'm glad the video is helping people. I'm waiting to get an angry call from White Labs because of all the people reusing their yeast lol.

I doubt you will get an angry call from White labs. Chris White covers this in his book "Yeast" with Jamil Zainasheff. I think the only call you might get is concerning terms "yeast rinsing" vs "yeast washing". I enjoyed your video though.If that doesn't help someone get started nothing will.
 
after washing i got about 1/4" in each four jars. is this enough for a batch after a starter is made or do you combine a couple to make one. I may have missed this earlier. Thanks for video anyway to save some cash is great!

Also is it possible to use distilled water rather than boiling and cooling water?
 
This saves me hundreds of dollars a year. Great post.

That's what I like to hear! See, more money for equipment, ingredients, commercial beer, electric bill (lower priority).


I doubt you will get an angry call from White labs. Chris White covers this in his book "Yeast" with Jamil Zainasheff. I think the only call you might get is concerning terms "yeast rinsing" vs "yeast washing". I enjoyed your video though.If that doesn't help someone get started nothing will.

They do cover it. Obviously joking, although I'd get a kick out of it if people like shroomzofdoom put a dent in their bottom line. Thanks for the kind words on the video!

after washing i got about 1/4" in each four jars. is this enough for a batch after a starter is made or do you combine a couple to make one. I may have missed this earlier. Thanks for video anyway to save some cash is great!

Also is it possible to use distilled water rather than boiling and cooling water?

How much yeast you have in the jars is a very common question. Check out the comments of this post, but I'll post my main comment here:

The answer is actually on the pitching rate calculator.

If you go to the calculator at mrmalty.com there is a tab called “Repitching from Slurry.” It’s confusing looking at first, but there are instructions here: http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/repitch.html.

Basically, it lets you estimate your yeast concentration in a slurry, and then tells you how many milliliters you need to pitch for a given batch of beer. So if you’re like me and you store your washed yeast in pint mason jars and you know you need 100 ml of slurry, that would be ~ 20% of the mason jar filled with yeast slurry. The book actually has a page or two on this very topic and gets more in depth about how to estimate concentrations.

Hopefully that helps.

As for using distilled water, I'd still worry about it not being sanitized. Yes maybe the water is, but those plastic jugs? Who knows.
 
Never mind, answers found in your FAQ! My bad for not reading there first...
 
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