Yeast starter for barley wine

[lorne17]

Hey All,

I have a smack pack 1098 Brittish Ale Wyeast for my Barley wine. I'm planning on brewing on Memorial Day. So I am boiling 5 cups water and added about 3/4 cups DME to it. When that's done I'm going to have a quart of wort for my yeast pack.

I tried searching but can't quite seem to find a good tutorial. How do I work this up to 1 gallon for my barley wine? Do I need to boil and add DME 2 or 3 times to a gallon? Then do I pour off the beer and pitch just the yeast when I pitch my 5 gallon beer?

Does that make sense? I found a post that says I should start at 1 quart and work up to 1 gallon, but I'm not sure the steps to do that. Adding water to it can add bacteria so I want to make sure I'm doing it right. If I need to boil 4 more cups to 1/2 gallon DME (is that the right ratio?), I can do that, but want to know how often and how much each time in my 3 days that I have from now.

Thanks,
Lorne

 

[Ryush806]

I would honestly forget a random post you found and use something like http://yeastcalculator.com/ to determine what you need to do.

For example, assuming you're making a 5 gallon batch and your OG is going to be 1.100 then you could do the quart starter you have already done, let it ferment out, chill it in the fridge to get the yeast to mostly go to the bottom of your jug.

Yeast Calulator says after the quart you would then need a gallon yeast starter to get up to the proper cell count.

So make a gallon of starter (use the same ratio so a gallon of water would need about 2 1/2 cups of DME for the gallon). Then decant most of the liquid off the top of your original starter but leave a little bit. Swirl up the yeast and pitch it into the new gallon and let that ferment out.

The day before you brew put your gallon starter in the fridge to drop the yeast out again. Then when you're ready to pitch your yeast, decant most of the liquid and swirl the yeast up and pour them in.

 

[lorne17]

Thanks for the quick reply, so you're saying keep my 1 quart starter, then make a separate 1 gallon starter? I only have one smack pack?

I just need to know how to add more to my starter? Do I do the DME boil all over again, chill it, then add to my starter? So it's basically adding more food to my yeast? I don't need to add more yeast when I add more wort right?

Thanks,
Lorne

I would honestly forget a random post you found and use something like http://yeastcalculator.com/ to determine what you need to do.

For example, assuming you're making a 5 gallon batch and your OG is going to be 1.100 then you could do the quart starter you have already done, let it ferment out, chill it in the fridge to get the yeast to mostly go to the bottom of your jug.

Yeast Calulator says after the quart you would then need a gallon yeast starter to get up to the proper cell count.

So make a gallon of starter (use the same ratio so a gallon of water would need about 2 1/2 cups of DME for the gallon). Then decant most of the liquid off the top of your original starter but leave a little bit. Swirl up the yeast and pitch it into the new gallon and let that ferment out.

The day before you brew put your gallon starter in the fridge to drop the yeast out again. Then when you're ready to pitch your yeast, decant most of the liquid and swirl the yeast up and pour them in.

 

[Ryush806]

Thanks for the quick reply, so you're saying keep my 1 quart starter, then make a separate 1 gallon starter? I only have one smack pack?

I just need to know how to add more to my starter? Do I do the DME boil all over again, chill it, then add to my starter? So it's basically adding more food to my yeast? I don't need to add more yeast when I add more wort right?

Thanks,
Lorne

Yeah you're basically making more food for the same yeast. Except that the yeast will multiply many times over eating a gallon of starter to give you the cell count you need. No need to get another pack of yeast. The whole point of the starter is to buy just one thing of yeast and grow it up to a big enough cell count.

So if your starter is done fermenting, put it in the fridge overnight. If you just made it wait until tomorrow night and put it in the fridge.

The next evening make your one gallon start by adding 2.5 cups of DME into a little over a gallon of water and boil for ~15-20 minutes or whatever. Then chill it down to room temp.

Take your original quart starter out of the fridge and pour most but not all of the liquid off the top. Then use the remaining liquid to swirl up the yeast and dump it into the gallon of new starter.

 

[lorne17]

Ah...I get it now! Thanks. Sorry I couldn't figure it out sooner!

 

[hottpeper13]

When I make a big beer like that I make a starter for a 1.040 5 gal beer and then make that beer then pitch the cake from that into the big beer. Why waste 1 gal for a starter when you can get 10 gal from the same yeast pack?

 

[BigFloyd]

When I make a big beer like that I make a starter for a 1.040 5 gal beer and then make that beer then pitch the cake from that into the big beer. Why waste 1 gal for a starter when you can get 10 gal from the same yeast pack?

This^^^^^^.

Brew a 1.040-1.050 starter beer and then use most of the resulting cake for the very high gravity batch.

 

[lorne17]

Hey guys,

Thanks for the replies. I started a Yeast starter on Thursday, it was one quart. My yeast still hasn't started to become active. Should I make some more wort and put it in? I plan to brew tomorrow.

Thanks,
Lorne

 

[Gofastr1]

Hey guys,

Thanks for the replies. I started a Yeast starter on Thursday, it was one quart. My yeast still hasn't started to become active. Should I make some more wort and put it in? I plan to brew tomorrow.

Thanks,
Lorne

Hopefully not too late for this. If your starter isn't yet active three days after making it, something's not right as it should be done by now. Apologies if I'm asking really silly questions for you, but:

1 - did you cool the starter wort before pitching your smack pack?
2 - did you warm the smack pack to room temp, smack it and let it swell before pitching into your starter wort?
3 - did you keep starter temp up nicely (65-70F)?
4 - did you aerate the wort (covering your quart jar and shaking vigorously) before pitching?

I wouldn't think #4 would keep your yeast from kicking off by now, but not doing #1 will kill your yeast and any of the others may cause a delay to and/or slow activity.

If you can, wait to get a good starter going before brewing.

If it's too late, chillax, and pitch your entire starter - unless your answer to #1 is no and your yeast is dead. Then make sure your sanitization post boil is flawless, get another smack pack ASAP (like tomorrow when your LHBS opens), make sure to do #2 above, and pitch it into your wort. Depending on how big your beer is, you may want to get two smack packs, pitch one ASAP as noted, and begin another starter with the second.. and follow mrmalty advice on making/using starters. I forgo all The Math and go from smack pack to a ~1.5 quart starter, let it finish (~2 days) then crash in refer (~ a day), decant and use that slurry to do over in a 1 gallon starter, and use that slurry to pitch big beers.

Of course, +5 to hottpeper if you have time to brew and capacity to store more beer!

 

[lorne17]

1 - did you cool the starter wort before pitching your smack pack?
2 - did you warm the smack pack to room temp, smack it and let it swell before pitching into your starter wort?
3 - did you keep starter temp up nicely (65-70F)?
4 - did you aerate the wort (covering your quart jar and shaking vigorously) before pitching?

Thanks for the response Gofastr1.

Here's a response to your questions:
1. Yes I cooled it to 78 degrees before pitching.
2. It was room temperature, but no it did not swell before I pitched it. I smacked it basically an hour before pitching. Give or take.
3. Yes I did, it was right in that range in my basement.
4. Yes I did, shook it like a madman for 2-3 minutes. My wife even made fun of me...hehe.

I think the real reason, is the Yeast is dated December 2014. So I think even though it says 6 month shelf life, that it was dormant and not responding. So I will go buy some more today. I actually purchased this from Northern brewer and the packet says 1098 Brittish Ale, but the recipe kit calls for 1945 NB NeoBritannia. So I think I got the wrong yeast anyways.