White Rabbit Dark Ale Clone

[Acasta]

will the yeast be able to handle 1L straight from this 100ml? Over last night theres a tin layer on the bottom of the jar (500ml jam jar)
So argon, your saying don't shake or anything if i am going to pitch into wort, but if its a batch just for growing its ok to stir, then decant the beer intop after chill?
Im planning on brewing on wensday, so i might crash chill it tomorrow and give it sunday-wensday morning to grow (with shaking and stirring), then decant and make a starter wensday morn to pitch that night/noon.
Is that too excessive?

 

[Screwtop]

Alright, im trying to culture some of this yeast and i got a few questions. Im fairly new to yeast culturing, i've only done coopers before.

I've done the dregs from 6 bottles and 100ml water and 10g LDME, followed all the sanitary steps. Its been 2 days and there is a little amount of stuff in there, maybe a thin layer diameter of 10cent coin.

Just wondering; How long will it take to step up to full batch around 87ml? How many steps? how do u know when a step is done? What step ups should I use and how long roughly would the yeast take to get thorough each batch?

Thanks alot.

A ,
Once fermentation has ceased (look through the container with a light source, no bubbles rising up the inside wall of the container - its finished), then step again by adding more wort.
Steps are usually 10 times so next 1 litre. Next would be 10L which is pretty much unpractical so maybe 4L. Step until once fermentation is finished you have the amount of yeast slurry required to pitch to your beer. Use the Mr Malty calculator to determine the amount of slurry required for the volume and gravity of your beer you plan on pitching to. Refrigerate for a couple of days to drop out, syphon off the beer with sanitised tubing to leave the slurry, measure the volume you have, need more - pitch to more fresh wort. Once I have the correct amount I make a 2L starter and pitch to that, it will be active quite quickly, pitch the active starter.

Cheers,

Screwy

 

[Acasta]

sweet, do you pitch the whole 2L in? That would dilute my 19L batch a fair bit haha.

EDIT: well on second thoughts, im doing high gravity wort, so ill be adding 4-5L water to the fermenter anyway. This should work.

 

[Phoney]

From my experience a 2L starter wasnt needed. I pitched a 500ml and it kicked off strong the following day and fermented out to 1.016 within a week. What's the benefit of making a huge starter and potentially diluting your hopped wort?

 

[Acasta]

Well for me, im doing high gravtiy wort, so 2L wort or 2L water wont bother me.

But i see what your saying too. Screwey does double batches, so 2L to 46L isn't a massive deal.

 

[Screwtop]

sweet, do you pitch the whole 2L in? That would dilute my 19L batch a fair bit haha.

EDIT: well on second thoughts, im doing high gravity wort, so ill be adding 4-5L water to the fermenter anyway. This should work.

For an Active Starter take 2L of wort from the fermenter and then pitch this when active, reduces lag time greatly. I won't pitch 2L of stepped up wort (shaken/aerated on the stirplate). Occasionally I do pitch 2L active starters of DME wort, to some beers. Easy enough to adjust hopping in recipe formulation.

What's the benefit of making a huge starter and potentially diluting your hopped wort?

Use a 2L starter as I want some yeast to begin budding before pitching. Starter can be the same wort as your pitching to, doesn't have to be DME wort like you would use for steps!

Screwy

 

[argon]

...snip
So argon, your saying don't shake or anything if i am going to pitch into wort, but if its a batch just for growing its ok to stir, then decant the beer intop after chill?
...snip

Firstly... listen to screwy... he's about a billion times more experienced than me at all this.

Secondly this is how i do it.. simple formula;
1 make starter, cool, aerate, add yeast, aerate, aerate, aerate, wait for ferment to stop, decant, add slurry
or 2 make starter, cool, aerate, add yeast, wait for ferment to stop, add whole batch of starter.

Essentially if you're adding the entire batch of starter beer you don't want to aerate after you've added the yeast and fermentation has begun.

 

[Screwtop]

or 2 make starter, cool, aerate, add yeast, wait for ferment to stop, add whole batch of starter.

Essentially if you're adding the entire batch of starter beer you don't want to aerate after you've added the yeast and fermentation has begun.

For some reason, maybe my poor communication skills, but I'm not getting the message through. Pitching an "active starter" is different to building/stepping yeast. An "Active Starter" is pitched when the starter is actively fermenting. Pitching and "active starter" shortens lag time.

For those shy of pitching full starter volume, drop out the yeast in the fridge and pitch the slurry, however pitching slurry is like going back a step, fermentation has to begin all over again. That is pitching yeast slurry not a starter.

Sorry argon, maybe nit picking but:

2 make starter, cool, aerate, add yeast, wait until active fermentation is observed before pitching whole batch of starter.

Active fermentation (krausen is not always evident, use a light source, look through the side wall of the starter vessel, should see lots of Co2 bubbles rising up through the wort)


Screwy

 

[argon]

For some reason, maybe my poor communication skills, but I'm not getting the message through. Pitching an "active starter" is different to building/stepping yeast. An "Active Starter" is pitched when the starter is actively fermenting. Pitching and "active starter" shortens lag time.

For those shy of pitching full starter volume, drop out the yeast in the fridge and pitch the slurry, however pitching slurry is like going back a step, fermentation has to begin all over again. That is pitching yeast slurry not a starter.

Sorry argon, maybe nit picking but:

2 make starter, cool, aerate, add yeast, wait until active fermentation is observed before pitching whole batch of starter.

Active fermentation (krausen is not always evident, use a light source, look through the side wall of the starter vessel, should see lots of Co2 bubbles rising up through the wort)


Screwy

Thanks Screwy totally happy to be corrected I did have a reread of what I posted and, yep youre right, I am incorrect in the phrase, wait for ferment to stop

I guess 2 different goals 1 wait to stop = building yeast, wheras, look for active ferment = active starter

Firstly... listen to screwy... he's about a billion times more experienced than me at all this.

another good save by me... :icon_cheers:

 

[AndrewQLD]

To me the whole idea of building up a starter is to create enough viable cells so that lag time is reduced and you don't have to pitch an active starter, I can't see the necessity of building up your cell count to a 2 lt starter volume only to pitch the whole lot when it is active.

Why not just pitch your wyeast into a 500ml starter and let it get to high krusen and then pitch into your brew, I mean the commercial yeasts are supposed to be pitching quantities after all so there should be no need to build them up, just get them active.

If I build up to a 2 lt starter from a saved vial or slant when the ferment has finished I decant all but 100ml of the wort after the yeast has dropped out of suspension , swirl and pitch into my brew. There is more than enough yeast to start fermentation within a couple of hours maximum, that way I am brewing the recipe I have designed and not adding another dimension of 2lt of fermented beer.

This method has worked exceptionally well for me for years and while I probably build my starters differently to others, I drain the wort from each step as I build my starter prior to pitching the next lot of wort for the next step up, I still can't see the need to pitch active starters if your yeast volume is large enough.

But hey it's courses for horses and we all have our own methods.

Andrew

 

[Sydneybrewer]

ok so i am finally going to put down my clone this week and i have the re-cultured yeast about 2cm thick in the bottom of the bottle, but my only concern is the overpowering sulphur/ egg fart smell of the cultered bottle.. is this normal?

anyway below is the recipe i am going with

Wort Volume Before Boil: 25.00 l Wort Volume After Boil: 23.00 l
Volume Transferred: 23.00 l Water Added To Fermenter: 0.00 l
Volume At Pitching: 23.00 l Volume Of Finished Beer: 19.00 l
Expected Pre-Boil Gravity: 1.046 SG Expected OG: 1.050 SG
Expected FG: 1.011 SG Apparent Attenuation: 77.9 %
Expected ABV: 5.2 % Expected ABW: 4.1 %
Expected IBU (using Tinseth): 33.9 IBU Expected Color (using Morey): 21.3 SRM
BU:GU ratio: 0.67 Approx Color:
Mash Efficiency: 70.0 %
Boil Duration: 60.0 mins
Fermentation Temperature: 18 degC

Fermentables
Ingredient Amount % MCU When
Australian Traditional Ale Malt 4.000 kg 72.7 % 4.9 In Mash/Steeped
German CaraMunich I 1.000 kg 18.2 % 12.7 In Mash/Steeped
Belgian Special B 0.300 kg 5.5 % 16.0 In Mash/Steeped
UK Pale Chocolate Malt 0.200 kg 3.6 % 14.5 In Mash/Steeped

Hops
Variety Alpha Amount IBU Form When
NZ Pacific Gem 14.0 % 10 g 14.5 Loose Whole Hops 60 Min From End
NZ Pacific Gem 14.0 % 20 g 14.4 Loose Whole Hops 15 Min From End
NZ Cascade 8.0 % 30 g 5.0 Loose Whole Hops 5 Min From End

Yeast
White Rabbit Cultured

 

[AndrewQLD]

I'd be a bit wary if the sulphur smell is very strong, some yeasts will clear the problem up if it is a normal side affect produced by the yeast but if it is because the yeast has become infected or suffered undue stress in the bottle you will be disappointed with the final results.
If it was me I'd toss it and use a more reliable source.

Andrew

 

[Acasta]

Cool thanks guys, put me at ease and ill follow your advice screwey. I was didn't think of making a starter from my own wort
We'll see how it goes. Brewing on Wednesday.

 

[Sydneybrewer]

Thanks andrew... Hmmm something to think about now, it will be a pita to have to reculture again but i guess the positives and possible negatives outweigh the task of starting over.

 

[Gout]

I went to young and jacksons in melbourne today after the..... footy if you call it that and asked for a dark ale and was told they no longer serve little Creatures beers.... i was thinking ohhhhh what and she offered me a bottle of LCPA - strange


i have had it (dark ale) in the bottle a few times and really think it was poor however on tap it was great. guess will stick to my home brew

 

[rude]

I recon use nottingham yeast see how close you can go with that yeast

 

[Screwtop]

To me the whole idea of building up a starter is to create enough viable cells so that lag time is reduced and you don't have to pitch an active starter, I can't see the necessity of building up your cell count to a 2 lt starter volume only to pitch the whole lot when it is active.

Why not just pitch your wyeast into a 500ml starter and let it get to high krusen and then pitch into your brew, I mean the commercial yeasts are supposed to be pitching quantities after all so there should be no need to build them up, just get them active.

If I build up to a 2 lt starter from a saved vial or slant when the ferment has finished I decant all but 100ml of the wort after the yeast has dropped out of suspension , swirl and pitch into my brew. There is more than enough yeast to start fermentation within a couple of hours maximum, that way I am brewing the recipe I have designed and not adding another dimension of 2lt of fermented beer.

This method has worked exceptionally well for me for years and while I probably build my starters differently to others, I drain the wort from each step as I build my starter prior to pitching the next lot of wort for the next step up, I still can't see the need to pitch active starters if your yeast volume is large enough.

But hey it's courses for horses and we all have our own methods.

Andrew

Exactly, and Andrew knows his stuff, his runs on the board prove that unreservedly!

I tried 500ml and 1L starters from smack packs but found 2L shortened lag time. An email to the manufacturers confirmed that at 2L some cell growth had begun, smaller batchers were basically just going straight to fermentation phase, then needed to get going on cell multiplation once pitched. Pitching a fresh smackpack straight to wort takes longer to get going. Yeast in the smackpack may be fresh but it's not in the best shape it could be in, as Andrew found once yeast has cycled it is in prime condition and ready to go for the next brew, lag time is very short in this case.

The best advice for any brewer is to experiment, great way to learn!

Screwy

 

[Acasta]

When CCing do drop yeast out, how long would it take roughly in the fridge?

 

[sav]

So how are the tasting of this beer, I bought a six pak for x-mas and Its time to brew it.




sav

 

[Acasta]

Made this up, its pretty damn good.
Use Simpsons for the crystal and get the yeast cultured from the bottles.
Enjoy.


Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 27.00 L
Boil Size: 31.40 L
Estimated OG: 1.055 SG
Estimated Color: 47.6 EBC
Estimated IBU: 30.6 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.0 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
4.94 kg Pale Malt, Traditional Ale (Joe White) (5Grain 71.9 %
0.84 kg Munich, Dark (Joe White) (29.6 EBC) Grain 12.3 %
0.42 kg Crystal, Dark (Joe White) (216.7 EBC) Grain 6.1 %
0.24 kg Cara-Pils/Dextrine (3.9 EBC) Grain 3.5 %
0.24 kg Carafa Special II (Weyermann) (817.6 EBC)Grain 3.5 %
0.18 kg Crystal (Joe White) (141.8 EBC) Grain 2.6 %
30.00 gm Cluster [7.90%] (60 min) Hops 20.6 IBU
20.00 gm Pacific Hallertau [5.00%] (20 min) Hops 5.3 IBU
50.00 gm Cascade [5.50%] (5 min) Hops 4.8 IBU
20.00 gm Cascade [5.50%] Hops -
1 Pkgs Essex Ale Yeast (White Labs #WLP022) Yeast-Ale