Re Used Trub

[fergi]

well guys i have just kegged my coopers pale ale, as usual coopers rehydrated yeast, this time i have dumped a coopers sparkling ale"with bits" onto the trub, i left about 1 litre of the trub in the fermentor and swirled it around gently to mix, added the wort etc, put this into my fermenting fridge @17 deg, now after 30 mins i had 5 ml foam on top and airlock plopping away about 1 per second, i reset my fridgemate back abit to 16 deg to just slow this action down a bit as i can forsee a krausen attack from the fermenter shortly. hope i havent overpitched , this is the first time i have tried this
cheers fergi

 

[unterberg]

Its obviously overpitched. 1 litre of trub could be a lot of yeasties.
Empty the trub out and just use a smaller amount next time (half a cup is probably still plenty).

For now I think a colder temp is probably a good idea to keep the fermentation down a bit but you probably will have to watch it and maybe even take some krausen off. I dont think there is much else you can do. Open fermentation would probably be ok for the first day and then when its slowed down put the lid on.

 

[rclemmett]

I did that once............... It wasn't a good idea. The fermenter tried to walk out of the fridge.

When I did it the fridge wasn't turned on as I had no temp controller, just used ice. When I came back 12 hours later it had gone from 19C to 27C, the ambient temp was 15-19C at the time. Such a vigorous generates alot of heat, so it might be a good idea to back the temp of the fridge down a bit more.

 

[Steve]

(half a cup is probably still plenty).

yep - half a cups enough. Better start thinking a blow off tube

 

[fergi]

well i have wound the tempmate back to 12 deg, see if that slows them up a bit ,will watch and if ferment starts to slow too much i will up the temp a little , does this overpitch give many undesirable off flavors.
cheers
fergi

 

[QldKev]

Its obviously overpitched. 1 litre of trub could be a lot of yeasties.

You will find a lot of seasoned brewers actually pitch straight onto a full yeast cake without any issues. The only thing you should be concerned about is if pitching a different style of brew onto a yeast cake. A Pilsner on a Stout yeast cake may produce unexpected flavours.

QldKev

 

[fergi]

You will find a lot of seasoned brewers actually pitch straight onto a full yeast cake without any issues. The only thing you should be concerned about is if pitching a different style of brew onto a yeast cake. A Pilsner on a Stout yeast cake may produce unexpected flavours.

QldKev

no basic same aussie pale ale style kev.
fergi

 

[rclemmett]

You will find a lot of seasoned brewers actually pitch straight onto a full yeast cake without any issues. The only thing you should be concerned about is if pitching a different style of brew onto a yeast cake. A Pilsner on a Stout yeast cake may produce unexpected flavours.

QldKev

When you have a large yeast mass on the bottom of the fermentor, you have a large potential for off-flavors due to autolysis.

John Palmer How to brew

Autolysis happens much quicker when you over pitch because your yeast is skipping over the aerobic phase of the yeast life cycle. Fewer new cells are created and your fermentation will not be optimal. You are creating a retirement community of yeast cells. The yeast will not be as healthy and will die sooner. Too much dead yeast creates a really nasty off flavor in your beer.

The one time I pitched onto the yeast cake this happened to me. However, the beer I did fermented out at about 27C which I think was largely to blame.

I would not pitch onto the whole yeast cake again, but thats not to say it doesn't work............

 

[thunderchild]

people much cleverer than I pitch onto the yeast cake with no probs. The one warning that hey gave me was to be ableto control temp (I.e fridgemate) otherwise you may have a hollywood blockbuster on your hands. (Attack of the yeastie beastie)

 

[raven19]

I have had good success taking a tablespoon of trub and reusing straight away on hte next batch of wort (appropriate sanitation measures in place of course!).

Doesn't take off too quickly, seems to be just right.

2c.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

re-pitching a "similar" strength beer onto a whole yeast cake isn't optimal - oh sure, it works, but its not optimal. As Rob2 said, you need some yeast growth, and in a finished beer of the same strength, there isn't going to be any, there are already enough cells for that amount of that strength beer.... its just that they are tired cells, low on resources, that have just dropped into their dormant phase at the end of a fermentation.

Autolysis will happen more readily, and you wont get the flavour development that you would expect, because a lot of that happens during the yest growth rather than the fermentation stages

Pitch em into a bigger volume or a bigger beer, with some nutrient and some oxygen... they will go back into growth phase, pep themselves up and pop out a bunch of fresh new cells as well, mollifying the effects of overpitching.... but a whole cake would still be too much for optimum growth.

Pitching onto the whole cake for sure works... and it is definitely easy, its not likely to wreck your beer, but IMO its not by any means the "best" way to do it.

I'd go with closer to 500ml of very runny slurry if going form a low OG beer to a high OG beer, and more like 0.5 cup of the slurry if going back into a similar strength beer.

TB

 

[KGB]

Yeah, I agree with whats already been said - next time sanitise a schooner and re-use about half the glass full of slurry and it should work well.
Another option I thought was a good idea was to actually bottle your trub and chill it, then if you don't want to start the next brew straight away (or want a different brew next) you've got a supply of yeats ready to pitch. Just pull a stubby from the fridge, let it come to room temp and pitch. Best to use PET bottles in case you have unexpected carbonation results etc.
I know there are a couple of members using variations on this idea, maybe Bribie for one?

 

[andrewg1978]

Yeah, I agree with whats already been said - next time sanitise a schooner and re-use about half the glass full of slurry and it should work well.
Another option I thought was a good idea was to actually bottle your trub and chill it, then if you don't want to start the next brew straight away (or want a different brew next) you've got a supply of yeats ready to pitch. Just pull a stubby from the fridge, let it come to room temp and pitch. Best to use PET bottles in case you have unexpected carbonation results etc.
I know there are a couple of members using variations on this idea, maybe Bribie for one?

I have used as little as 200ml to re-pitch and has worked well. sanitising is the key.

 

[fergi]

well this brew has finished, after 3 days, it went from 1050 to 1012, tastes really nice from the test tube so i have dropped it into a cube, i have put it back into fermenting fridge at 2deg, i dont normally chill my beer into secondarys anymore as i usually put them straight into a keg, gas them for a week and they turn out fine,this time i am keen to try this way so i am thinking of leaving it in there for 3 to 4 days then kegging, whats the general opinion on this idea, i do like my pale ales though to have that cloudy look and i think it has a nutty flavor with a bit of yeast in it.

cheers
fergi

 

[QIK86]

Is the yeast trub still reusable when full of particles from hop pellets? Would the hop flavour and aroma then be noticable in the next brew?

 

[buttersd70]

well this brew has finished, after 3 days, it went from 1050 to 1012, tastes really nice from the test tube so i have dropped it into a cube, i have put it back into fermenting fridge at 2deg, i dont normally chill my beer into secondarys anymore as i usually put them straight into a keg, gas them for a week and they turn out fine,this time i am keen to try this way so i am thinking of leaving it in there for 3 to 4 days then kegging, whats the general opinion on this idea, i do like my pale ales though to have that cloudy look and i think it has a nutty flavor with a bit of yeast in it.

cheers
fergi

Normally, I rack to cube, fine with geletine, leave 3-4 days then keg. However, I like clear beer. For cloudy beer...may as well go straight to keg. Going to the cube is done for 2 reasons, to aid it dropping the yeast out, or to give it some age and condition. The first isn't needed in your case, and the second can be done in the keg anyway (if you have the keg space).

 

[Bribie G]

I regularly use some of the yeast cake to start the next brew, but don't pitch directly onto the old cake. I much prefer to clean and sanitise the fermenter and tap first. As I often dry hop, the fermenter is an ugly looking crime scene after the primary fermentation.

 

[David Sinclair]

This is a little OT but can you re-use the yeast cake after using geletine or does geltine render the yeast useless?

 

[neonmeate]

sorry to nitpick but a lot of you seem to be using the word "trub" to mean yeast cake, or slurry - trub is not yeast, it is the protein and fats and crap that's come out in the hot and cold break that you certainly don't want to repitch

http://www.brewingtechniques.com/library/b....2/barchet.html
http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter6-8.html

best way to reuse yeast is to scoop up all the active yeast off the top when it is at high krauesen.

 

[Cube]

Is the yeast trub still reusable when full of particles from hop pellets? Would the hop flavour and aroma then be noticable in the next brew?

I do this every brew. I have never had any adverse or wrong hop flavours. I only use 1/2 cup of yeast cake per brew, which is generally a total of half of one brew yeast cake.

I've had yeast cake in the fridge for 4 weeks, even more, and it still goes off within 18 hours of pitching directly into fermenter.

The last packet of US05 I bought was October last year if I'm not mistaken. I'm almost at the end of the generation cycle now with two pitches left to bring it up to the sixth generation.. Now that's economy. Each whole yeast cake gets split into two, then two again after next brew and so on until I hit 6. So that's 12 or more brews from one packet of US05.

I'm going to use coopers ale yeast next time and re use that in the same manner. I'm hoping for good results since I brew mostly pale ales. Good excuse to grab a couple of tallies as well.