Starter questions

[BudNini]

I am starting my plans to brew a 6 gal batch of Sweet Meadowfoam BOMM.
My first question is, will this be a good starter for a 6 gal batch?;
1 lb of honey,1TBSP of fermaid O, water to 2 liters and 1 activated smack pack of wyeast 1388.
Next question is, I don’t have a flask so can I use a 1 gal carboy instead? There won’t be any heat used.


Someday I pray I will be answering these questions for another newbie lol

 

[Seamonkey84]

Yes that i believe is the standard starter recipe for BOMM. I always do mine in 1/2gal demijohns or 1gal carboys. No heat needed unless it’s really really cold in the room, they grow fastest at 68F but don’t need to be exact. Too much heat gives possible off flavors.
I kept a bit of the starter to make a one liter sized starter to grow yeast for my future batches, and just keep using and feeding the colony.

 

[IslandLizard]

Absolutely, a 1/2 or 1 gallon jug will work fine. I also use 1/2 gallon glass pickle jars (wide mouth, easier to clean).
Now if using 1/2 gallon vessels, maybe limit your volume to 1.5-1.6 liter to allow some headspace to prevent or reduce blow off?

Before I used a stir plate (mostly using an orbital shaker now), I've lost the better half of many starters to sudden blow off (always overnight), ending up on the countertop.

I don't know much about making meads. I'm guessing making yeast starters for mead would be similar to those for beer?
If that's true, a pound of honey (at 35 ppg) in 1/2 gallon (or 2 liters) would yield a gravity of around 1.060-1.070. That sounds really high/strong for a starter, we typically limit the gravity to 1.037-1.040. Again, maybe a higher starter gravity is beneficial for meads, I don't know.

Yeast starters need oxygen to propagate well. So swirling as often as possible helps to oxygenate the starter mead. No lid, leave (loosely) covered with a tent of aluminum foil and in a warmish place (over 66F). Kitchen perhaps? But not directly on a (cold) stone countertop.

Instead of intermittent swirling look up shaken-not-stirred starters.

 

[BudNini]

Yes that i believe is the standard starter recipe for BOMM. I always do mine in 1/2gal demijohns or 1gal carboys. No heat needed unless it’s really really cold in the room, they grow fastest at 68F but don’t need to be exact. Too much heat gives possible off flavors.
I kept a bit of the starter to make a one liter sized starter to grow yeast for my future batches, and just keep using and feeding the colony.

This starter is from the Berry Death BOMM recipe, I wasn’t sure if it could be used for a traditional BOMM.

 

[BudNini]

Absolutely, a 1/2 or 1 gallon jug will work fine. I also use 1/2 gallon glass pickle jars (wide mouth, easier to clean).
Now if using 1/2 gallon vessels, maybe limit your volume to 1.5-1.6 liter to allow some headspace to prevent or reduce blow off?

Before I used a stir plate (mostly using an orbital shaker now), I've lost the better half of many starters to sudden blow off (always overnight), ending up on the countertop.

I don't know much about making meads. I'm guessing making yeast starters for mead would be similar to those for beer?
If that's true, a pound of honey (at 35 ppg) in 1/2 gallon (or 2 liters) would yield a gravity of around 1.060-1.070. That sounds really high/strong for a starter, we typically limit the gravity to 1.037-1.040. Again, maybe a higher starter gravity is beneficial for meads, I don't know.

This starter is from the Berry Death BOMM recipe, I wasn’t sure if it could be used for a traditional BOMM.

Yeast starters need oxygen to propagate well. So swirling as often as possible helps to oxygenate the starter mead. No lid, leave (loosely) covered with a tent of aluminum foil and in a warmish place (over 66F). Kitchen perhaps? But not directly on a (cold) stone countertop.

Instead of intermittent swirling look up shaken-not-stirred starters.

for not knowing much about mead you sure gave me some good information. I am shooting for a FG about 1.020

 

[Seamonkey84]

https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/BOMM5gallons/
Don’t use such a low gravity, beer is different as it’s more difficult for the yeast to use the sugars in grains. 1.070 is actually kinda low gravity for a mead.

 

[BudNini]

https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/BOMM5gallons/
Don’t use such a low gravity, beer is different as it’s more difficult for the yeast to use the sugars in grains. 1.070 is actually kinda low gravity for a mead.

If this post is ment for me it is way over my head lol

 

[RPh_Guy]

@loveofrose your berry death recipe uses a high gravity starter; is that right?

@BudNini I would suggest the starter recipe in the regular BOMM recipe
https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/BOMM5gallons/
As well as the "new" staggered nutrient protocol described there.

 

[IslandLizard]

https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/BOMM5gallons/
Don’t use such a low gravity, beer is different as it’s more difficult for the yeast to use the sugars in grains. 1.070 is actually kinda low gravity for a mead.

I was talking about keeping the gravity of the yeast starter around 1.037-1.040 to propagate the yeast most effectively. I know the actual batches of meads are way stronger than that, 1.100 being the bottom end.

I am shooting for a FG about 1.020

That's the target FG for your main batch, right? I was talking about the starter's starting gravity to propagate the yeast before pitching into your main batch. Yeast doesn't propagate well in higher gravity worts and musts.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Right, I think Bray maybe had a typo in that recipe's starter instructions. ?

 

[IslandLizard]

Right, I think Bray maybe had a typo in that recipe's starter instructions. ?

Bray has it like this:
-1800 ml of Ozarka spring water
-1/2 cup of honey (SG ~1.04)
That doesn't seem to come out right either, as it yields a starter gravity of only 1.027.

 

[RPh_Guy]

starter gravity of only 1.027.

I'd say that's a lot better than 1.070, especially for a starter not continuously aerated.

Unlike with wort starters for beer, additional honey doesn't provide significant amounts of nitrogen, phosphorus, vitamins, or trace elements needed for yeast growth.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Maybe the higher gravity in the starter is to get the yeast use to growing in a a higher gravity before being pitched into something that’s at 1.150.
Well, I make small scaled down BOMM with the 1lb/2liter for my continuous yeast culture, with the fermaid K and O, along with the potassium bicarbonate. I then pitch most of the colony into my next batch, and start another liter or two with the reserved ounce or two of the starter. Kind of reminds me of keeping a fish bowl honestly.

 

[BudNini]

On Brays site there is a recipe for a 1 gal Sweet Meadowfoam BOMM ,this is a traditional sweet mead. I want to make a 6 gal batch. I have scaled everything by 6. I know I need a good starter SO in my newbie thought process I thought I could use a starter from another recipe. So I stole the starter from the Berry Death recipe thinking that would work just fine. Lol guess I am wrong. This is where I stand now.

 

[loveofrose]

Right, I think Bray maybe had a typo in that recipe's starter instructions. ?

Nope. Berry Death BOMM is a tough environment for yeast. As a result, higher ABV acclimated yeast work better. In addition, anything below 1.080 is a cakewalk for 1388.

 

[loveofrose]

On Brays site there is a recipe for a 1 gal Sweet Meadowfoam BOMM ,this is a traditional sweet mead. I want to make a 6 gal batch. I have scaled everything by 6. I know I need a good starter SO in my newbie thought process I thought I could use a starter from another recipe. So I stole the starter from the Berry Death recipe thinking that would work just fine. Lol guess I am wrong. This is where I stand now.

You are fine. Either would work.

 

[BudNini]

You are fine. Either would work.

Thank you for the clarification

 

[bernardsmith]

This is a fascinating discussion: it assumes that the yeast colony you typically pitch when making a mead is as small as the yeast colony you pitch when brewing beer. Now, I realize that the recipe for a BOMM uses a slap pack and that that slap pack was designed for brewing beer but if you check most packs of wine yeast you will see that you get a far larger colony than you do when you buy a beer yeast. And typically, typically, wine and mead makers don't use stir plates and don't make starters , not least perhaps because a winemaker really has no problem with lag time in a way that a brewer might given the propensity of the wort to sour if the yeast has not overwhelmed any lacto-bacterial activity quickly enough. Heck! many wine makers allow their fruit to macerate for two or three days before they pitch the yeast to encourage indigenous yeast to provide some complexity to the flavors in the must.

 

[RPh_Guy]

As a result, higher ABV acclimated yeast work better.

Is there science behind this?

propensity of the wort to sour

Lactic acid bacteria are rarely an issue for most brewers (and yeast don't "overwhelm" them anyway).

Brewers make starters because liquid yeast loses viability relative quickly. Increasing the cell count avoids numerous potential fermentation issues.

 

[bernardsmith]

Lactic acid bacteria are rarely an issue for most brewers (and yeast don't "overwhelm" them anyway).

I guess I meant that the yeast create an environment that they prefer and which dis-prefers any fungi or bacteria that might compete for the available sugars and in so doing the yeast "overwhelms" those life forms ...But insofar as you suggest that souring is not an issue - I would have thought that one reason that brewers try to cool their boiling wort so quickly was precisely to inhibit the activity of those lactobacteri and once cooled they are on pins and needles if the lag time stretches a few hours. Hence they create a starter and the lag time is reduced to zero.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Increased pitch rate helps prevent certain microbes from taking hold, but not others. Lactobacillus is one microbe that is not significantly inhibited by Saccharomyces activity (in beer); they co-exist quite happily.

Fast chilling may help reduce the likelihood of contamination, but mainly by reducing the time where the wort is exposed to air. There are other reasons why we like to chill quickly (which I won't derail the thread discussing). Microbial growth during the chilling phase is basically never a concern unless you are using a "no-chill" method.

Lazy brewers (for a lack of a better term) direct pitching liquid yeast may commonly see lag times of 1-2 days or longer. Even with a starter, lag time (in beer) is still often 4-18 hours depending on various factors -- similar to a healthy pitch in wine.

 

[Squeegee]

What’s the condition of the must?