Author: Ray Found
We’ve all heard it. Hell, we’ve probably all said it: “A single vial or smack pack, regardless of what it says on the package, isn’t enough yeast to perform a healthy and proper fermentation on 5 gallons of most styles of beer.” I know I have. As beer drinkers go, I am pretty tolerant, but the one thing I cannot stand is an under-attenuated, sticky-sweet mess. Call it what you want, but as a new brewer I learned the key to avoiding a cloying disaster was to mash low and, perhaps more importantly, pitch a ton of yeast.
On the other side of the coin, yeast suppliers, White Labs in the case of this xBmt, provide instructions on their packaging that differs substantially from this commonly accepted homebrewer wisdom, suggesting a single vial is sufficient for 5 gallons of wort up to 1.070 OG.
I have been working on developing an easy drinking West Coast Amber Ale, the type of beer I buy when I’m out of town and don’t know what’s good, something that may not blow your socks off, but always pleases. My perfect Amber (which I have yet to find commercially) would be firmly bitter, aromatically hoppy, with a complex and sweet balancing malt profile. It would never, ever, be under-attenuated. Despite a fairly robust 6%+ ABV and medium body, my dream beer would be supremely drinkable with every pint leaving me wanting another. What better beer, then, to test just how important pitch rate is to achieving that fully-attenuated, crisp finish I long for?
| PURPOSE |
To evaluate the differences between a split-batch of the same wort, half pitched with a single “pitchable” vial of yeast and the other half pitched with an adequately sized yeast starter.
| METHOD |
After much soul searching (ahem… drinking), grain chewing, and brewing this over and over in my mind, I finally settled on a recipe consisting of zero American Crystal malts.
American/West Coast Amber Ale
| Batch Size | Boil Time | IBU | SRM | OG | FG | ABV |
| 11 gal | 60 min | 62 | 15.6 | 1.063 SG | 1.015 SG | 6.3 % |
Fermentables
| Name | Amount | % |
| Domestic 2-Row | 15 lbs 4 oz | 67.5 |
| Munich (10L) | 5 lbs 7 oz | 20.0 |
| Gambrinus Honey Malt | 2 lbs 3 oz | 8.0 |
| Special B | 13 oz | 3 |
| Pale Chocolate | 6.5 oz | 1.5 |
Hops
| Name | Amt/IBU | Time | Use | Form | Alpha % |
| Magnum | 20 IBU | First Wort Hop | FWH | Pellet | 12.0 |
| Columbus | 28 g/6.6 IBU | 15 min | Boil | Pellet | 17.0 |
| Centennial | 155 g/22 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 10.2 |
| Mosaic | 84 g/13.7 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 15.0 |
Yeast
| Name | Lab | Attenuation | Ferm Temp |
| San Diego Super Yeast | White Labs 090 | 75% | 66°F |
The yeast starter calculator projected I would require 237 billion cells given my expected OG, yeast manufacture date, and 5 gallon batch size. Extrapolating from the information provided on the packaging and based on what we’ve been taught about yeast viability, we can assume the vial being pitched on its own contained approximately 56 billion cells, while the starter would be propagated to approximately 400% that amount, and pitched into the starter batch. I made a starter a couple days prior to brewing, making sure to overbuild to harvest some for future use.
After a couple days, the starter was crashed overnight, decanted, then the remaining slurry was allowed to return to ambient temperature in preparation for pitching. The single vial was removed from the fridge the morning of brew day and allowed to warm up for a few hours prior to being pitched.
I performed a single infusion mash in my new Coleman Xtreme 70-Quart MLT and nailed my target mash temp.
An hour later, the sweet wort was collected and subsequently transferred to my boil kettle where it met a charge of Magnum hops.
The wort was boiled for 60 minutes with hops being added at 15 minutes and flameout.
Following the 15 minute hopstand, my JaDeD Brewing Hydra IC (thanks Mom! One of my favorite Christmas gifts) was put to use, dropping the temp of my wort to 72°F in under 10 minutes.
A hydrometer sample revealed a SG of 1.065, which thanks to my poorly calibrated hydrometer consistently reading .002 points too high, meant I hit my expected 1.063 OG.
The wort was equally split into separate 6 gallon PET carboys, moving the hose back and forth to ensure both received similar amounts of kettle trub. I shook to aerate (my normal method) then placed both carboys in my temp controlled fermentation chamber.
I went ahead and pitched at 72°F, and set my fermentation chamber to my target ferm temp of 66, one batch was dosed with a single vial of WLP090 while the starter slurry was pitched into the other carboy.
As is usually the case, within 7 hours of pitching yeast, the starter-pitched beer had already formed a substantial krausen and was showing all the normal signs of active fermentation I’d come to expect. The vial-pitched beer? Yeah…not so much.
At 18 hours in, the vial-pitched beer appeared unchanged while the krausen continued to build on the starter-pitched beer.
The krausen reached the top of the carboy starter-pitched carboy just a couple hours later, it was going bonkers. Still nothing in the vial-pitched batch.
By 26 Hours, the blowoff tube was proving necessary on the starter-pitched beer. The absence of any signs of fermentation in the vial-pitched beer was beginning to make me nervous, I’ll admit. It looked dead.
With only minimal sings of life at 31 hours in, I began wondering if I was going to lose 5 gallons of beer.
Finally, at 42 hours post-pitch, a full 36 hours after the the starter-pitched beer came alive, the vial-pitched beer had developed a krausen.
Throughout the remainder of fermentation, the starter-pitched beer maintained a more vigorous fermentation as evidenced by a larger krausen, greater blowoff, and finishing quicker.
I don’t usually disturb my beers before they’re done fermenting, but curiosity got the better of me and I pulled a gravity sample 4 days after pitching. The starter-pitched beer had nearly reached FG while the vial-pitched beer still had a ways to go.
At this point, I let the beers ride for a few more days at 66°F before ramping the temp to 72°F. A couple days later, 9 since pitching the yeast, I checked the SG again and discovered something surprising to me- both beers had finished at an identical 1.015 SG.
The beers were cold crashed, fined with gelatin, and after a few days, racked to kegs and carbonated. Data collection commenced about a week later.
| RESULTS |
A huge thanks to the Vince, Cameron, and Ray from Brew Crew, a nano-brewery incubator that recently opened in Riverside, CA, as well as the cool folks at Brew Toys, a new Riverside homebrew shop, for participating.
Thanks also to Ken Smith and the 13 other rad members of the Gambrinus Malting crew for taking time out of your day to contribute your palates to dorky homebrew science!
With a total of 20 participants, 11 correct responses would be required to reach statistical significance (p<0.05). Only 9 panelists correctly identified the different beer, suggesting a moderate OG beer fermented with a single vial of yeast is not reliably distinguishable from the same beer fermented with an adequately sized starter. Comments by the accurate tasters about the nature of the differences were not aligned in any noticeable trend, no one was able to correctly guess what the variable being tested was. I found it interesting that of the 9 participants who made it past the triangle test survey and to the blind comparative evaluation, 8 selected the starter-pitched beer as the one they preferred. Of course, due to our failure to reach statistical significance on the triangle test, this data ought to be interpreted with caution and, at the very least, taken with a massive dose of salt.
The results provided a pretty clear illustration of why using statistical significance is important: 8 participants chose green as being different. Just 1 shy of the red count, despite the fact that green was identical to blue.
My Impressions: I was able to identify the different beer in the two triangle tests I took, though it’s likely this was largely influenced by my obvious bias, as I found the differences to be extremely slight. Who knows how I would have performed if I had been unaware of what this xBmt was about? Personally, I perceived the starter-pitched beer has having slightly more hop aroma with a slightly less sharp flavor, however, when I tried the two side by side recently, I chose the wrong one as being the starter-pitched beer. Frankly, for a beer I was very nervous about, given the early fermentation being so sluggish, I was pleased at how subtle the differences between the beers ended up being and enjoyed drinking both batches.
As for the recipe, it’s an okay Amber, a rough draft that needs a few iterations to develop into something great. I’d be fine drinking this beer in a pub or restaurant with dinner, it is perfectly pleasant, but it can be made better.
| DISCUSSION |
I’m inclined to defer to the yeast labs here and suggest that perhaps they know a thing or two about how their product is going to perform. At the same time, the fact a beer made with a single vial of yeast pitched directly into wort was not reliably distinguishable from a beer fermented with a “proper” amount of cells propagated in a starter, well, that sort of bewilders me. Chris White has hinted that a lot of the pitch-rate calculations are based on commercial breweries, where they are re-pitching from one fermentor to another, and that lab-grown yeast will perform differently, perhaps that has something do with it. But still, the sluggish start and overall slower completion time of the vial-pitched beer was not ideal, in my understanding at least. In that 36 hour lag time, any beer spoiling microorganisms that made it beyond my sanitation attempts could have been multiplying and ruining my beer. Additionally, the slower completion time means a slower overall turnaround for a batch, if only by a couple days – this makes a difference if I am trying to get a beer ready for an event of some kind.
I’m interested to see this xBmt repeated at some point with a beer that is yeast-driven in nature, like an English or Belgian style ale, as my inclination is that we may potentially see different results when yeast character is the star of the show. That being said, as homebrewers, we sure make a lot of American-style Pale, Amber, and IPA, and my hunch is these results would likely transfer to any of those styles, as we likely all know (or have heard from) plenty of brewers who make tasty beer using a single vial of yeast.
Do I have plans to change my process as a result of these findings? Absolutely not! I will continue making starters from liquid yeasts as I believe the benefits outweigh any disadvantages– faster starts to fermentation, quicker completion time, harvesting clean yeast to save for future batches, and re-energizing old stocks, to name a few. But despite this personal commitment to making starters, I will be a lot less inclined to suggest that taking a vial home from the store and pitching it directly into one’s wort is an egregious error that guarantees certain doom, at least for most beers homebrewers are making. While I fully accept that these results would potentially have been different had I pitched a single vial into a RIS wort of 1.100 OG, my dogmatic conviction that a single vial of yeast cannot produce a tasty beer has waned. In this particular case under this particular set of conditions, it did, and I didn’t expect that.
Finally, the whole pitch-rate thing is something I’ll likely be a little looser with, as well. I’ve always adhered strongly to the recommended pitch-rates offered by my favorite yeast calculators, though now I’m beginning to question just how much a couple billion cells really matters. For example, if the calculator suggests my batch “requires” 300 billion cells but I’m only able to propagate 220 billion in my 2L flask, I’ll probably not worry much about stepping the starter up, as I’m not convinced the difference will have all that big of an impact.
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62 thoughts on “exBEERiment | Yeast Pitch Rate: Single Vial vs. Yeast Starter In An American Amber Ale”
I used SDSY on a 1.045 session IPA recently. Straight pitched and I was nearing the “best used by” date. Plan was to build the yeast up with this beer and pitch a larger on the cake in a couple weeks. I felt it was ok and didn’t have any DME for a starter. Bad call. Took several days to get going at 65*, ramped it up to 68, it finished and I did a rest at 72 before cold crashing. This was over a 2 week period. Kegged it even though it smelled a bit like rotten eggs. Once carbed it has a baby juice flavor, hardly any hop aroma (3.5oz in this recipe). Likely dump it or make A LOT of brats this summer. (:
I’m hesitant to comment on cause of anything without it being a split batch at this point.
I didn’t expect that outcome! I should research a bit more into this now with a fresher mind but I’m also inclined to being a bit less strict about my starters, specially my obsession with estimating cell count without the proper lab equipment.
Thanks for sharing those Exbeeriments!
I didn’t either.
Cool exBEERiment. I’ve done both, starter and just US-05 packet sprinkled into wort, never had a problem either way. Having said that, I was under the impression that a starter helps for a coupled reasons: 1) quicker start to fermentation means faster utilziation of oxygen in the wort and less chance of oxidation effects, and 2) quicker start prevents possible contamination because the yeast start to take over faster.
Are these actual reasons or is this a myth?
The starter pitched batch was waaaaaay faster.
Very interesting experiment.
I would be interested to see the results of an experiment comparing the different yeast starter calculations given that using the braukaiser formula I get nearly 500 billion more cells than using the Chris White formula using the same inputs.
Kai has the research he presented on his website, while the Whites have a yeast company and the yeast book (which I assume contains the methodology & formula – it’s awhile since I read it).
That’s more of a lab test question, than a pragmatic brewing question like we normally tackle, unless I am misunderstanding.
Hi Ray,
It’s possible I’ve not been clear (or maybe I’m not right in my thinking – happens more often than not!)
The calculations suggest I need XX many billions of cells – this doesn’t change, what does change is the amount of starter needed (between Braukaiser & White/MrMalty).
eg, a 50L (I occasionally have that big a brew length) 1.060 wort needs ~550Billion cells
Braukaiser suggests I can get 555B with 3.3L of a 1.036 worth
White suggests I need 12L to get 556B cells (1.036).
They can’t both be right! Maybe it’s something to do with scaling the formula that makes it go off slightly.
Playing with the yeast calc, The White formula suggests that by only creating a 3.3L starter you are only getting 350Billion cells, therefore ‘underpitching’
I guess part of it is lab test (as in, do you actually get XX many more cells with one method or the other), but it may also be practical (similar to the above experiment, does flavour/character change).
Thinking about it more, it is similar to the above, because you have a vial amount of cells, then a step up to a starters worth of cells, where as my pondering is almost a small starter stepping up to a bigger starter.
There is probably not much testing that can be done outside a lab except for the subjective ‘what tastes best – a 3L starter or a 12L starter’
Given how fast the fermentation starts with the braukaiser method is there any need to get to 12L, when 3L does a good enough job (especially given the lack of layman perciving significant difference between vial & starter).
Also – who has room to build up that much starter!!!!
Keep up the good work – ta
I use the calculator on homebrewdad, which uses Kai’s formulas. As for how many cells there really is? Don’t know. This was more a pragmatic approach test of two different homebrewer methods: buying a vial and dumping it in vs. building a starter according to your favorite calculator.
Andy:
The difference between Kai’s numbers and White’s numbers is mainly that White’s numbers are estimates based off of other measurements while Kai’s were determined experimentally. The actual numbers you get varies quite a bit strain-to-strain, but I’ve found Kai’s numbers to be consistently more accurate.
Ray:
I wonder if you would have observed more dramatic differences with a yeast strain that imparts more of a character (e.g. an English or Belgian strain). 090 is about as mild a strain as you can find, and is pretty aggressive to boot. A less mild (or less aggressive, or both) strain may show larger differences. While not as rigorous a test, I did notice a huge (and beneficial) change in the flavour of my house bitter when I started using starters.
Bryan
No arguments there. Frankly, I was shocked at this result when I tasted the first sip. I expected significant differences, even with 090. As I mentioned, I am curious to try (or have someone else try) again with English, lager, or belgian strains.
As always, these results hint at more questions than answers.
I would throw out the idea that both Kai’s and Chris Whites formulas may be equally wrong or similarly inaccurate because of the assumptions they make in their modeling. This was alluded to briefly in Ray’s write-up in the case about how Chris White did their calculations based on microbrewery data.
There is also the issue of if what we are measuring is actually important to the final product. Sure, the time it takes to reach active fermentation seems relevant (if or no other reason than to out-compete spoilage bacteria), but Ray’s results seem to indicate this isn’t the case. However, there also isn’t a compelling reason NOT to shoot for a rapid fermentation, so there is that..
As I’m beginning to realize reading alot of these experiments, making beer isn’t rocket science and alot of factors that we have decided are important, really aren’t. I’m of the mind now to develop do more “eyeballing” and less calculations for stuff like that, so I can derive more enjoyment from the process.
I believe beyond reduced lag time, there is another factor in your want to continue making starters – that rad as hell stir plate you have!
Haha, thanks. The “Lego My Stirplate” will stay in the rotation, but I also have a Yeastir for when I need to spin two starters.
Was the beer everything you longed for in an Amber Beer? Any tweaks you would make for next time. I am looking for a good easy drinking Amber as a house beer.
No. I mean, It is a good beer, but it needs some more work to become house beer. But to me, it fades sort of into the mix of all those forgettable ambers I have had… I mean, good, enjoyable, but not life changing.
It balances more like a Red IPA in terms of bitterness – something I think I can tone down while keeping the same IBU and changing up the hopping blend (probably reduce/eliminate the CTZ). It has a touch more character than I want from the Pale Chocolate, I will probably pull that back to 1%.
I would suggest you try some Midnight Wheat in place of the Pale Chocolate. Briess bills it as a “bitterless black malt”, useful for adding color with the typical roasted malt flavor, I use it in my amber to good effect.
Before we had our second child I always did a starter! Now since I don’t have that luxury of time. I find myself just pitching just one vial or two depending on gravity straight in! I have never been disappointed by any of the 100s or so beers in the last three years I’ve done this way. Sure they maybe would have completed fermentation sooner, but the time laboring over starter sterilization and making sure its at correct temp is just something I needed more of with my family. To the brewers that soldier on with their pitch calculators, and proper 12-18 starters I say go for it, if it makes you feel better to do so brew your beer your own way!
I wonder if you would get the same results pitching the vial into a 1:1 “starter”. What I’m thinking is add 35mg of to a jam jar add the vial to the jar and shake to mix and get some o2 in. Let sit for about 12hr before pitching, that way the yeast is active and had a small snack before going to work.
Although from what I can tell yeast will start quicker the longer it has sat out, but I have never tested that.
Is that basically what a wyeast smack pack does?
I have noticed that pitching a single vial of this yeast at that low of a temp to start really makes it struggle and agitation to get yeast into suspension will greatly reduce it’s lag time. Think of it almost like English Ale in that regard. Also water high in calcium also increases it’s propensity to floculates early at low temps (your temps don’t SEEM low for this strain, but for straight pitching it is)
Take this into account that yeasts are budding to reach an equilibrium of sorts in cell count and you have a long lag time.
I’ve done many many batches and tests on this strain. Try pitching about the same amount as a single vial in a second gen yeast from slurry. I’ve noticed on all my batches it’s always shorter for some reason even with the same water/recipe. That could be that the yeast are more ready to go (like a starter almost) vs half asleep and being rushed to the dinner table 😛
As a scientist/home brewer, I love the website and have recommended it to friends! Just a few questions, some general, some pertaining to this exbeeriment.
1. Statistically, what tests are you using to determine “significance”? I ask because the sample size are pretty low and that would greatly impact your results (geek question, I know). Parametric tests with small samples are often problematic.
2. You almost always seem to know the difference in the beers – is it a bias because you know they’re different or because you’re more experienced than the other testers?
3. I’ll continue to make starters – in fact, I pitched a huge one yesterday because of the new stir plate and its first use. Any potential downfalls of a large or at least regular sized starter? Any brews that are not best served by a starter?
4. So many of the tests seem to have results that are inconclusive. For the homebrewer, based on your finding, what are the couple of things that we can do to make better beers or what are the couple of things we can avoid to keep from bigger issues?
Thanks!
-JGF
We’re using p<.05 for triangle test. You can easily google "triangle test statistics table" for a chart of the p values.
We're also working on an article that tackles a lot of the questions you're asking!
Us authors knowing the difference is likely due to confirmation bias, and not a real effect in at least some cases. We do not include our self in taste results for precisely this reason.
Water chemistry appears to be an area of interest for making better beer that shows promise. Most of the results so far hint at things that don't, as an absolute truth, make beer significantly worse.
Kegging, anecdotally, is the single biggest thing one can do to improve beer that is already routinely "good"… In my opinion.
Interesting! Thanks. We just started kegging this winter and the last brewing session – yesterday! – was the first one we really started to alter water chemistry. Brewhouse efficiency went up nearly 20% after getting our pH inline. Bicarbonate for our water is off the chart (HCO3 = 499) and when we started blending with distilled H20, we got better efficiency and hopefully better beers. Feeling pretty good about our process!
Out of curiosity, what are the things you’ve seen make beers significantly worse, in your experiences? What are the few things that many homebrewers are doing wrong that are easily correctable?
I’ll look into that triangle test.
1. We’re currently working on an article that details the approach we use, hoping to publish it within the next few weeks, I won’t go into detail here. Triangle tests utilize the Chi square, fwiw.
2. I’m wholly convinced it’s 99% bias– even when I’m/we’re served the beers blind, I still know what to look for because I know the nature of the xBmt. We’re currently developing a new survey that accounts for this, should produce some interesting results. Also, I feel like I’m wrong as much as I am right. I did a triangle test 3 times last night on my latest xBmt, got it wrong each time…
3. I’m with you, I’ll continue making starters too! I think it’s nearly impossible to overpitch on the homebrew scale, if that’s what you’re asking. And I’ve heard a small amount of yeast stress can really drive some of the character from German Hef yeast strains, in fact I know a couple people who will only pitch single vials/packs for those styles.
4. I don’t really feel qualified to offer advice on how to improve your beer, so I tend to defer to the old “keep everything clean and sanitized” response. I’m still convinced most of the variables we’ve tested do have an impact, just not necessarily on their own– I haven’t gotten to it yet, but my hunch is a beer pitched and fermented at 75°F with an inadequate amount of yeast will likely differ from the same beer pitched and fermented at 65°F with an adequate amount of yeast. But who knows?
Thanks for the support. Cheers!
The yeast used in experiment was a very netrual profile yeast. Even with the yeast being stressed with low cell counts at pitching I doubt it had the ability to throw off that many off flavors.
From my experience, when I tried this with a english yeast it was completely horrible a ester bomb. All I did was make a to small of a starter without stir plate. Since then I make sure to use beersmith starter app and a stir plate, I still have flash backs to all those esters I had.
Really interesting results. I wonder if more o2, introduced via a stone, would affect the take-off time and the results. I’ve always heard that shaking doesn’t introduce enough o2. Though, the reason I love these exbeeriments is taking “from what I’ve heard” to actual blind taste tests.
I’ve actually heard that O2 is essentially unnecessary, even in big beers, when pitching active starters, which led me to wonder if recommendations to use pure O2 were at least partially a function of the fact people weren’t pitching starters. Could make for an interesting future xBmt!
Great read! For what it’s worth, this is by far the best amber I’ve ever brewed and one of my favorites to keep on tap. http://www.bertusbrewery.com/2013/04/american-amber-30.html Scott has a great brewblog and some really tasty recipes.
Interesting. I wish he was still blogging more. Seems to have kind of quit writing.
Any thoughts on an experiment that includes extra oxygen along the way (either via stone or shaking) during fermentation? Everyone comments on not doing it because of oxidation, but I wonder if that might have helped in this case for the vial pitched beer? The wort is actually just a giant starter that you ferment to completion. It could also be an interesting experiment on if oxidation during fermentation is a myth, and might really be a storage/packaging concern.
We do have some things in the works that might shed some light, but not specifically the methods you mentioned. Something to consider for sure, I usually hear of adding oxygen during fermentation for very high gravity beers.
Interesting findings. I use US-05 sprinkled directly onto the top of the wort and usually see activity within 6 hours and then its chugging away the morning after brew day. The biggest factors I’ve found for reducing lag time are…..1/2 tsp of yeast nutrient added at the end of the boil and proper aeration.
Cool write up, thanks! I often wondered about pitching enough yeast. In the past, I would make a lot of malt extract kits, and I would just pitch the enlarged smack pack, or make a small starter from liquid vials (without a stir plate, just hand swirled every once in awhile) and pitch that. Never had a problem, even with the high gravity kits. Only once did a beer not finish fermenting in 45+ kits.
Now that I’m doing all-grain (and I mimick brulosopher’s batch sparge process) I make nice big starters with a stir plate and harvest some future use. It’s a pretty nice feeling to see your beer take off under 12 hours from pitching. Keeps me from getting all nervous and fidgety, and second guessing what I did wrong on my brew day.
I will probably continue to make starters, but it’s nice to know that the vial is still capable of functioning without building up in a pinch.
Ray, your work is very interesting! Thanks for sharing. One comment on the possibility of microorganisms growing during the lag. Keep in mind that at that point the yeast is growing like mad too. I suspect it would still require big contamination to beat out the yeast. 40 batches into brewing I find beer hard to ruin.
Well yes. But it isn’t the yeast growing that makes wort inhospitable to other microorgs… it is their fermentation. So I do think contamination is a risk of a slow fermentation start, at least from a purely theoretical standpoint.
Contamination is caused by a mistake by the brewer. Is it not? Not by a 36 hour lag time.
Only a few days off, but you would add a day or so for starter making as well as another point of potential contamination. Honestly I’ve only made a few starters, some with major under fermentation issues. Now I may never make one again.
True. Though A starter takes 10-15 minutes on a day I’m probably not otherwise be able to brew anyway.
agree, Matt. I think it’s kinda funny how most people don’t actually follow the findings of these experiments, including the author (who has other reasons, I know I know). A starter, to me, involves a lot of planning ahead of time. I say “hey, I got a few hours, I’ll make a beer today. And then I do it.” Don’t get me wrong, reusing yeast is awesome, but it seems like bottling/packaging day is the easier, more logical way to do that. get that slurry. IMHO.
Depends on your situation and brewing “calendar” I suppose. For mine, I “no-chill” my wort. That is, drain it into a large HDPE water container about 10 minutes post boil, seal it up and let it cool down by itself. I can already hear people going “DMS!”, yeah, never experienced it and neither has anybody else I know who no-chills.
A few days before I plan to ferment it, I make a starter. I harvest some of it when ready, then whack it in the fridge to settle it out until pitching day. If clean yeast is the desire, harvesting from starters is a much simpler way than pissing about with slurry from a batch of beer, in my mind.
OK, Great resurch!
Now lest go for something with a bit more yeast character. WY1968 ??
Just made a 4 gallon batch ( decided to try your exbeeriment ) of 1.058 Pale ale and pitched one vial of WLP007. I was wondering if I was going to have similar lag time but 18 hrs in and I have a small krausen forming ( chest freezer set to 63 ambient ). Wonder why yours had such a lag time ?
Different yeasts, different gravities, maybe different oxygenation, different yeast age, etc…
Well my experiment has ended in failure. Fermentation temps at 68 for the first 5 days and then 70 for the last 10 days. Went to keg and the reading was 1.022. Glad this worked for you but I will use a started next time. The use by date on my vial was mid july so I know it was fairly fresh. Damn the luck.
Maybe try making a 1pint small starter, spin for 5-6 hours, and pitch… See if it cures the stall.
Regarding your perfect Amber Ale which you have yet to find commercially, have you tried Troeg’s HopBack? To my palate, it tastes exactly as you describe. I’ve been working on recreating that beer at home for a few years now since its not available in the beer stores here.
As far as high rates of attenuation are concerned, I feel like mash temperature (or adding dextrins), yeast strain selection and proper oxygenation have more impact than starters. I pitch 1 dry pack of US-05 in most of my ales and consistently finish in the 1.010-1.006 range.
i’ve run similar experiments using just one pack of white labs pure pitch without a starter. i’ve used wlp001 and wlp 002 into OG up to 1.065. I used recipes I’ve made many times with starters. With pure pitch, my packs were at most 4 weeks old- high viability. I had no significant difference in lag time with 1 pack pure pitch vs white labs vial and yeast starter (usually 12-18 hours until krausen). the results have been very positive-producing high quality beers with no discernible negative attributes.
In looking at both this XBMT and the Yeast Vitality Starter XBMT, it seems like the Vitality Starter would be the best compromise between a direct pitch and a properly sized starter. Hell, it might even produce the same results as a normal starter every time. I say that for two reasons:
1. In this XBMT, the beers came out the same, however there was significant lag time, which could allow nasties to take hold before the yeast has a chance to get started.
2. In the Vitality Starter XBMT, the beers also came out similar, but the Vitality Starter showed activity at 7 hours, just like the regular starter; a significant improvement over the direct pitch.
These two XBMTs show me that maybe cell count isn’t as important as we are all saying. Maybe we’ve had it wrong this whole time. It wouldn’t be the first time that “common knowledge” in homebrewing has been proven wrong. We were told not to squeeze the grains after steeping or mashing so you wouldn’t extract tannins. Now we know that tannins are a function on pH and temperature.
I think more experiments in this area are definitely needed (direct pitch vs vitality starter vs properly sized starter). Given the amount of variables that are involved in brewing, more examples would show whether cell counts truly matter.
A couple things come to mind.
1. This is likely very strain dependent.
2. I agree that the key benefit from starters may not be cell count, but perhaps vitality/activity.
3. lag time is still somewhat concerning to me, for the reasons you mention.
4. Obviously all of this only applies within some reasonable cell range – I am pretty certain that regardless of how vital they are, if I put 1b cells in a batch (instead of 100b), the beer’s not coming out the same.
5. I have used small vitality starters extensively for american styles, without noticing any negative impacts.
The last pitching rate paper I looked at in the scientific literature cracked me up. A lager strain (I think the Carlsberg one) at increasing pitch rates produced no change in ester production. What did happen was that diacetyl production skyrocketed with increasing pitch rate. Pretty sure all of that goes against homebrewer dogma.
I’m sure everything is strain, wort composition, temperature, oxygen, and phase of the moon dependent.
Hey Ray
This: “My perfect Amber (which I have yet to find commercially) would be firmly bitter, aromatically hoppy, with a complex and sweet balancing malt profile. It would never, ever, be under-attenuated. Despite a fairly robust 6%+ ABV and medium body, my dream beer would be supremely drinkable with every pint leaving me wanting another.” is pretty much a perfect description of what I look for in an amber ale.
Have you found your perfect recipe for this elusive drink yet? If so, are you willing to share it?
YES! My “Make America Amber Again” is just about perfect for my tastes.
http://imgur.com/a/hmlZO
I know Jake has brewed it and loved it, as well as a couple local friends. Give it a shot!
Awesome, thanks! I will give this a try so I have some amber ale for the fall :)!
Can I get our mash and fermentation temp? And I assume you’re using cone hops and not 120g of Cascade pellets? thx!
Chris – I only ever use pellets. Note the batch size – that’s 11 gallon+ batch.
I mash it 152-154 generally for an hour.
Missed the 11 gallon batch size, that makes sense! 🙂
Thanks again
Interesting experiment and results. I love your work.
My take- at a pinch you can probably get away with under-pitching. However, if you do it all the time eventually you will encounter problems.
However, if I was peer-reviewing this experiment for a good scientific journal, I would likely suggest the manuscript be rejected, based on the low sample size! (n=20). Not enough power to detect differences
It probably wouldn’t make for a good blog, but really these experiments need to be replicated multiple times by different brewers. Then all the results need to be pulled together and assessed by systematic review. If the results held true, then we could really say, you don’t need a starter!
Hmm, I can’t say my experience matches the results of this experiment. I use Wyeast smack-packs and never make starters for 1.060ish 5 gallon ales, and I have never seen a 40 hour lag phase. 12-24h is typical for me, with 12h most frequent, and occasionally just 6 or 7h hours lag.
A few suggestions for future trials…
1) Mix the two vials together beforehand in order to eliminate a potential difference in yeast viability between vials as a variable.
2) Try this with other yeast brands. As per my above remarks, I have never experienced long lag times when direct-pitching Wyeast packs.
3) As the author suggests, a yeast-driven beer would be great for a retrial. Perhaps even a simple kölsch? Any differences will be more apparent.
I have never used yeast starters and I don’t aerate my chilled wort beyond splashing it into the fermenter. My fermentations also lack precise temperature control, but I do log the temp. and try to make adjustments. I get two issues with my fermentations, one recurring problem and another that appears sporadically. I consistently miss my final gravity by a few points even with a finish at 22-23 oC for ale yeasts. I’ve had one issue with acetaldehyde off flavours after I under pitched with safale-05 dried yeast in an IPA. I’m attempting different fixes to both issues, and I suspect they are both linked to improper aeration or underpitching. I am therefore going to try making yeast starters to see it fixes the issues. When my equipment improves (limited by cash) I’ll attempt better temperature control.
Regarding your results, maybe under pitching is less of a problem if you follow other “best practice”, e.g., proper aeration and good temperature control during fermentation?