Harvested Two Hearted yeast finally took off

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Dear [Brew_G]:

Thank you for taking the time to contact us. I am glad to hear you enjoyed Two Hearted Ale!

For pitching your yeast, you will want to cool down to about 64 degrees Fahrenheit before aerating and pitching. For fermentation, the temperature range can be pretty variable, but I would recommend you ferment a little warmer than most ales, maybe 70 to 72 degrees.

Aromas during fermentation should be very slight fruit, but clean otherwise. Attenuation of our yeast is pretty high but will depend on pitch rates and fermentation temperatures. ...

Sincerely,

Melissa D
Brand Ambassador
Bell's Brewery, Inc.

I've been using a harvested Bell's strain as my house yeast for a few years and usually get close to 85% attenuation when mashing at 150 and fermenting in the mid/upper 60s. It's definitely great stuff!
 
I've been using a harvested Bell's strain as my house yeast for a few years and usually get close to 85% attenuation when mashing at 150 and fermenting in the mid/upper 60s. It's definitely great stuff!


Awesome info. Thanks, CastleHollow!

Vigorous fermentation for my brown ale has been at 67-68F, but the temp started to come down as the fermentation has slowed. My ambient basement temp is between 61-64F, so it won't go any lower than that. Do you see any issue with that, or should I move the fermenter somewhere warmer to keep the temps up the whole time?
 
For a brown ale, I would err on the cooler side of things. Maybe as its 80% done start warming it up to the 66 or so to let it finish.

For a 2H clone, pitch at 64 and slowly ramp up to 68/69 near the end. Once you cross 67 or so you will start to take on the typical fruit flavors that are easily detectable in the original. I ferment my APA's in the same temp schedule.

Although they mention 70-72, the geometry of their tanks makes a difference. They can go warmer without creating as many esters with the huge benefit (to them) of quick fermentations. So although I can't say 70-72 wouldn't produce good beer (I have not gone that high in any of my 18 batches with Bells), it may have more esters than what you are trying to clone. Two pennies :)
 
You guys are talking about liquid temp right? Not ambient temp? I unfortunately do not have the luxury of controlling temperatures with a fermentation chamber alI I have is my 68° basementwhere I just let the fermentation do what it does. I've noticed one stuff is fermenting vigorously the fermometer reads mid 70's every time.

Also....now that I see the very first step has fermented a little bit and produced a little better krausen when should I step up the gravity of the next batch of wort to add
 
I've been able to make good slants from Two Hearted dregs. Being that we don't get Bells in Maryland, picking some up when visiting Michigan was at the top of my list. Starters from my slants worked fine and was able to make some good beer. Regardless of what their yeast may or may not be, I like keeping theirs in my inventory.
 
I recently harvested yeast for the first time myself, for my first Two Hearted clone. I harvested from three bottles, and then three more two days later. By day 5 I had krausen over an inch thick in my half-gallon mason jar. I manually stirred the hell out of it, a few times a day, by spinning the jar for a few minutes.

This has been one of my most vigorous fermentations to date from an ale yeast. My ambient temp is kept at 67*

I plan on washing this one and keeping it around.

I actually got the idea to harvest their yeast from Bell's own blog. It states that they use a house yeast, and it isn't available anywhere except from their unfiltered ales.

http://bellshomebrew.tumblr.com/post/66974707212/how-to-culture-bells-house-yeast-from-a-bottle-of
 
For a brown ale, I would err on the cooler side of things. Maybe as its 80% done start warming it up to the 66 or so to let it finish.



For a 2H clone, pitch at 64 and slowly ramp up to 68/69 near the end. Once you cross 67 or so you will start to take on the typical fruit flavors that are easily detectable in the original. I ferment my APA's in the same temp schedule.



Although they mention 70-72, the geometry of their tanks makes a difference. They can go warmer without creating as many esters with the huge benefit (to them) of quick fermentations. So although I can't say 70-72 wouldn't produce good beer (I have not gone that high in any of my 18 batches with Bells), it may have more esters than what you are trying to clone. Two pennies :)


I've been in touch with them a bit more today and they pretty much echoed your statements. The store manager (an avid homebrewer) said that I should shoot to keep it around 68F if I can. Going too much lower than that and the yeast might start to flocculate out and might not allow them to clean up. Going above that would give more fruity esters typical of TH, which isn't what I'm going for with this brown ale. I might do so for an IPA or hoppy APA.

In my original correspondence, I did ask about homebrewer temps, so I think the 70-72 is still legit, but for something more like Two Hearted.

I was 66F as of this morning, which down from 68F. I'm going to try to keep it a little warmer for the next few days to let things clean up.
 
You guys are talking about liquid temp right? Not ambient temp? I unfortunately do not have the luxury of controlling temperatures with a fermentation chamber alI I have is my 68° basementwhere I just let the fermentation do what it does. I've noticed one stuff is fermenting vigorously the fermometer reads mid 70's every time.

Also....now that I see the very first step has fermented a little bit and produced a little better krausen when should I step up the gravity of the next batch of wort to add


I try to distinguish fermentation temp from ambient temp. My basement ambient temp runs 61-64F this time of year; my fermentation temp has been up to 68F, but is now down to 66F.

Based on the feedback I've gotten from Bell's, I'd think that 68F ambient temp would work for something like an IPA. It might get a little too estery if fermentation goes above 72F though, so I'd watch it.

As for the second part of your post, let the yeast settle out for a bit, then go ahead and pop it in the fridge to cold crash for 12 hours or so. Decant the spent wort, then add about 750-1000 mL of fresh 1.030 wort and put it on your stir plate. Let that ride for 24-36 hours, cold crash for 12 hours, and decide from there if you need to step up again. If so, decant and go with 1.5L of fresh 1.030-1.040 wort on your stir plate for 24 hours. Cold crash. If you don't have a 2L flask, you could probably step up with another 1L to get some additional growth.

If all goes well, you should have about 75-100mL of thick yeast at the bottom of your flask after your cold crash. I poured about 1/4 of mine into a sanitized 250 mL jelly jar and topped off with boiled/cooled water, then popped it into the fridge for future use. I used the rest to pitch into my brown ale.
 
I'd just like to say that this has been a great conversation. I've really learned a lot from it. Thanks to everyone who's participated!
 
The temps I have been quoted is as close to liquid temps as I can come. I take a digital weather thermometer probe and tape it to the bucket/carboy with packaging tape. I have 2 folded up paper towels to the outside of the probe as insulation so that I get a better read on the bucket/carboy temp. I do the same thing for my A419 Johnson temp controller on my fridge.

I suppose the next step is a thermowell, but I haven't needed to go that far yet.
 
I've been waiting for your follow-up. Glad to hear it's working!

I'm five days into fermentation of my brown ale, and the temps went down quite a bit (down to 62F), so I moved it into the laundry room and have been blowing a space heater on it here and there. It's now at 65F and I have it wrapped in a jacket when the heater isn't on. It's started to flocculate, but there's still plenty of yeast in suspension. I'm hoping to keep the temps high enough to keep the those yeast working to clean up.

This process has taught me a *lot* and now has me looking into relatively inexpensive temp control.
 
So how do I know when I have enough for a 5 or even a 10 gallon batch. I mean I know there's calculators out there and what not and even one posted on the page 2 of this thread but how do I really know how many cells I even started with from a six pack of dregs and then now after stepping it up 3 times (this 3rd time btw is going phenomenal and going crazy in the flask on the stir plate). Any advice would be great thanks.
 
So how do I know when I have enough for a 5 or even a 10 gallon batch. I mean I know there's calculators out there and what not and even one posted on the page 2 of this thread but how do I really know how many cells I even started with from a six pack of dregs and then now after stepping it up 3 times (this 3rd time btw is going phenomenal and going crazy in the flask on the stir plate). Any advice would be great thanks.


It's impossible to know for sure if you have enough cells except if you actually count them. Thing is, you'd need equipment that I'm suspecting you (and pretty much everyone else) don't have on hand.

All I did was make an educated guess as to the amount of yeast that settled to the bottom of my flask. Since it was a thick layer of fresh yeast, I assumed 3-4 billion cells per ml of yeast. You then multiply that by your estimated thickness. If you've stepped it up three times, and you've noticed a good amount of yeast at the bottom of your chilled flask in previous steps, you can safely assume that you e got plenty. In my case, I estimated that I had about 33% too much, which is why I poured off about 25% into a sanitized jelly jar to use in a starter for a future beer.
 
By the way, I couldn't help myself and had a whiff of my brown ale earlier. I think the yeast might be helping give off some nice fruitiness.

Wow...if it tastes as good as it smells, it's going to be awesome.
 
Looks really good. Just by looking at the picture, I'd say you have more than enough for a 5-gallon batch. That's a nice layer of thick yeast and plenty in suspension. When you chill it for 18 hours or so, it'll clear up and the healthiest yeast that are in suspension will drop out, giving you an even thicker cake.

Use your own best judgment, but I'd suggest reserving some of that yeast (1/4 of it or so) for a starter on your next beer.
 
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1418786219.263923.jpg
Ok so I decanted off the fermented and cold crashed beer from the previous picture and tonight I washed it with sterile water and put it in this sterile jar. What am I lookin at here? Water...then yeast...then trub? Or is that all good yeast on the bottom AND in the middle (just still suspended). I don't see how I could have any trub since all I used was DME starters.
 
Yesterday, I bottled the brown ale I brewed with this yeast. Just under three weeks in primary and FG was 1.013 (OG was 1.055). Without temp control, it cooled down to 60F after vigorous fermentation was done, so I don't think I got the most out of it. Either way, the sample tasted nice, so I'm really curious to see how the final product comes out.

I'm also getting ready to hopefully brew next week, so I pulled the small jar that had about 25ml of thick yeast and made a 1L 1.040 starter yesterday. It's been on the stir plate for about 30 hours and it's looking (and smelling) great. I'm going to decant to about 500ml tomorrow, then swirl and pour off half into the 250ml jar for future use. I'll take the rest and step it up to a 1.75L starter for brewing on Wednesday or Thursday.

Next beer will be a MO/Centennial APA, so I'm planning to use my newly acquired aquarium heater and rope-handled tub to ramp temps up to 69-70F after main fermentation dies down in order to coax out some fruity esters. It'll be cool to see how different the results might be between the APA and brown ale.
 
Follow up on my recent experiences with this yeast:

The brown ale ended up being buttery, so I'm pretty sure the drop in temps after the first few days meant that they couldn't clean up the diacetyl. However, after being almost offensively buttery when poured after the first two weeks, it cleaned up really well by the third week and become a pretty big hit with the folks I served it to at a party. It was still buttery, but it had mellowed a ton.

I bottled the APA a couple days ago - OG was 1.060 and FG was 1.011, which put me at above 80% attenuation. It really ate through that wort. Not estery, but I'm not too worried about it. I didn't detect any diacetyl in the FG sample, so unless it crops up in the bottled beer, it seems that keeping the temps up made a big difference.
 
Good to know brewG. I read I. A different post that 76degrees is what Bells ferments this one at 76 degrees
 
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1421943452.747640.jpg
And lookie at what I made. This is pure white zero trub gold here. I got about 8 of these now after doing a serious step up on my brand new 5000ml flask. I stepped it up one last time. Cold crashed. Decanted with a turkey baster for precision. Rinsed with sterile water. And decanted the suspended yeast (again with the turkey baster and after the very little trub settled from the step starters) and was able to get this phenomenally looking pure white health yeast into 8 different jars. Anyone wanna trade me somethin for some??!!?
 
Bell's yeast is my all time favorite yeast. Apparently Bells uses one strain for all there beers from Porters to Hopslam.
 
I only have 2 bottles right now. Is it possible to harvest from just 2?


Should be ok. Baby it though for sure. Two cups water with enough DME to make a 1.020 first starter I think? I'm no expert by I had to "step down" cuz my initial starter was too high OG. It took right off once I re did it
 
I only have 2 bottles right now. Is it possible to harvest from just 2?


Should be ok. Baby it though for sure. Two cups water with enough DME to make a 1.020 first starter I think? I'm no expert by I had to "step down" cuz my initial starter was too high OG. It took right off once I re did it
 
2 bottles? Should be ok. Baby it though for sure. Two cups water with enough DME to make a 1.020 first starter I think? I'm no expert by I had to "step down" cuz my initial starter was too high OG. It took right off once I re did it
 
Good to know brewG. I read I. A different post that 76degrees is what Bells ferments this one at 76 degrees

There's a good chance they do ferment at 76, but keep in mind that the pressure in the huge conicals they use will help suppress off-flavor production. I contacted Bell's, and word direct from one of their employees (who is a big home brewer and runs their home brewing competitions) was that this yeast should be fermented by the home brwer in the upper 60s to low 70s.

View attachment 250577
And lookie at what I made. This is pure white zero trub gold here. I got about 8 of these now after doing a serious step up on my brand new 5000ml flask. I stepped it up one last time. Cold crashed. Decanted with a turkey baster for precision. Rinsed with sterile water. And decanted the suspended yeast (again with the turkey baster and after the very little trub settled from the step starters) and was able to get this phenomenally looking pure white health yeast into 8 different jars. Anyone wanna trade me somethin for some??!!?

Pretty...
 
Bell's yeast is my all time favorite yeast. Apparently Bells uses one strain for all there beers from Porters to Hopslam.

They use different yeast for the Winter White and ther lagers, but I think they use that house yeast for pretty much everything else. I'm using it as my sole yeast right now, so I'm planning to really get to know it.
 
Should be ok. Baby it though for sure. Two cups water with enough DME to make a 1.020 first starter I think? I'm no expert by I had to "step down" cuz my initial starter was too high OG. It took right off once I re did it

Happy to report it can be done with 1 bottle. I'm 5 days in and it did great. I just stepped it up with some 1.040 wort.
 

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