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Hello Folks

Having read about yeasts it intrigued me that the smallest amount of yeast could technically grown on and on and on. So recently I did a 60% corn 30% malted barley 10% malted rye mash, and the starting gravity was 1.060. I was using US 05 yeast, and here in Ireland I find yeast to be expensive (bakers being the exception).

So I made my starter for the yeast by adding 1 liter of wash and 1 liter of water (all at 30C) and added the (expensive) yeast all into a 5 liter jug as my starter. (call this jug the "starter jug"). After a half hour or so I duly pitched this yeast into my mixture of grains and water. Job done in this regards.

However I had in mind to try and grow on the residue of yeast remaining in the starter jug. This was literally the smear of creamy yeast on the inside of the starter jug. So after pitching my started yeast I was left with a starter jug with a smear of yeast around the sides and bottom of the jug. This smear of yeast is what I wanted to grow on. This photo shows the seed yeast I wished to try and grow on.
In preparation for this I had another liter of wash and 1 liter of water (again all at 30C) and with these liquids I washed/rinsed the yeast residue (inside of the starter jug) back into the starter jug itself.
After doing this I put my aquarium aerator into the starter jug, put cling film plastic over the top of the starter jug, and let it run for 4 days continuously. I kept the starter jug covered with towels so the yeast was in the dark - I dont know if this was necessary. I do not have a stirring plate so relied solely on the aquarium aerator.
On day 5, into this 2 liter mix of water and wash, I put in 250 grams of molasses and one pinch of epsom salts. The molasses was half a jar of blackstrap molasses, and before pitching this I put boiling water into the half jar (of molasses) and shook it well so the molasses was not thick and sticky when I was putting it into my starter jug. At all stages the aquarium aerator was running and I let the aerator run for another 2 days. At that stage I removed the aerator.

Next - I then let this mini fermentation work out for another 2 days. To be honest I saw little activity regarding fermentation. The sugar content would have been low and I did not expect much fizzing/yeast activity.

After these two days I wanted to see the end product and to see if I had increased the yeast content.
So to crash the yeast I then took the starter jug and put it into my jeep over night. The jeep is outside and the temperature of the night is question went down to freezing.

Here is a picture of the finished product after a night out in the cold. I appreciate the bottom creamy layer is a mixture of turb and yeast, but there is definitely a solid layer of yeast. I am going to use it to start another wash, and hopefully it will work. Fingers crossed.
So the moral of the story is that the yeast residue on the starter jug can be simply grown on in preparation for the next fermentation. It is not hard to do.

Hope this helps others, and I hope the more knowledgeable will be in a position to chime in as to how to improve this process.

Jimy

Here, this to go along with your "desktop manual"....
http://howtobrew.com/book/section-1/yea ... t-starters" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://www.instructables.com/id/Home-Br ... t-Starter/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
https://byo.com/resources/build-a-yeast-starter/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://homebrewacademy.com/how-to-make-a-yeast-starter/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

The internet is full of "how to's" for culturing and propagating yeast. A great way to economize your brewery.

But, my advice would be to propagate in a glass vessel because the yeast cells can get entangled in the plastic molecule causing a cross contamination of strains if you ever try to vary what you're brewing. You'll begin to homogenize the subtle differences between yeast genus through successive propagation.
ss

I buy one pack and split it 6 ways in quarts and grow it out. Each jar can split into six other jars. Fun in itself.

Nice write up of your experiment Jim, good man!

I read up a little on cultivating and storing yeasties like this. I need to refresh but you can use glycerine to store and freeze the yeast practically indefinitely for reuse. If you use water to freeze, the ice (water) crystals inside the yeast will swell and rupture the cel membranes - killing the yeasties. Using glycerine displaces the water out of the organisms and thus prevents the swelling when freezing and the yeasties then go dormant in the freezer environment until rehydrated into an environment where they can multiply (eg; starter jug * 90*F-100*F w/some mash).... If you set up for this kind of isolating, culturing, and storage then you could easily save some $$ on your yeastie purchases.

Oh yeah - You can also save and freeze some yeast trub and use that as nutrient. Maybe boil it first and make trub-cubes in the freezer.

Cheers!
-j

Charlie Papazian had a whole chapter on this in one of his Homebrewing books...it included making an acid wash to purify the strain before making on a gelatin slant, putting it under glycerine and storing it in the freezer. Never did it..just easier to drive to a homebrew store. I have saved yeast by bottling it and restarting it again a year or two later...this worked well. There was one strain I used to really like that was a seasonal yeast. I could save it by bottling a half dozen bottles and restarting it a day or two before brew day, never failed me.

Well folks, to post my results. This liquid yeast starter hit the ground running. I originally started from dried yeast and grew the smear of yeast left in the starter jug as outlined in the original post.

The original dried yeast took 2 to 3 days to kick in and start working, however when I pitched the grown-on liquid yeast as was in the last picture of the original post, it took less than 10 hours and it was in full swing.

If the layer of grains on the top of the fermentation is anything to go by, there was a very heavy thick layer of grains floating with this grown-on liquid yeast, (much larger in comparison to the dried yeast originally pitched in a different fermentation). I dont know if this is indicative of a stronger fermentation, but it was note worthy from a visible inspection.

I think I read some where that a liquid starter is better than dried yeast - may be one of the more knowledgeable could clarify this please. If this is the case my experiment supports this.

Finally for the record, if you look at the last photo in the original post, I strained off 90% of the dark brown liquid and then pitched what was left - turb and all. The whole lot went in.

So to all who have read this - I will be doing this again and again and again. Right now it seems to be the way to go. I must now talk to my beautiful wife to get space in the fridge for jars of liquid yeast !

Hope this adds to the excellent library of knowledge this forum represents to us all.

Jimy

PS - thanks to all who chimed in and added to this thread.

I like this post Jimy. As you know I just go to the home brew shop and get the type of yeast I need for what I’m making. I think if I plan on making lots of one type of whiskey this may be the way to go. Thanks for the post.
JBC

Personal fridge

jb-texshine wrote:Personal fridge

Hahaha!
My wife just got me a small one for Christmas.
JBC