Secondary / yeast reuse

Khannie

I'm out of yeast and I'm not arsed driving to get some / waiting for delivery. What I do have is the lees from a batch of ginger beer and the bottom of the batch prime from the same brew.

Now I could wash the lees from the primary, but to be honest it looks like a heap of effort to do that. Can I just dump my apple juice in on top of the end of the batch primed bit?

Carawaystick

Khannie wrote: »

I'm out of yeast and I'm not arsed driving to get some / waiting for delivery. What I do have is the lees from a batch of ginger beer and the bottom of the batch prime from the same brew.

Now I could wash the lees from the primary, but to be honest it looks like a heap of effort to do that. Can I just dump my apple juice in on top of the end of the batch primed bit?

I'd say it might be a bit gingery cider, but in a good way, better brewers than me have done this successfully

Khannie

I went with the wash in the end, just for the experience of it. I'll post pics in a bit.

Tube

Washing yeast is fairly handy. Here's a write-up I did earlier.

http://nationalhomebrewclub.com/wiki/doku.php?id=washing_yeast

Khannie

Here's a pic of mine after the initial wash and settle.

engrish?

I made a brew the other day and just threw about 1/2 of the yeast cake from an old brew in on top of the new. It took off like a rocket and its been bubbling away ever since!

Khannie

Yeah, I think that's probably the easy / lazy way to do it alright. If you wanted to kick off one brew straight after another I think you could get the same effect by doing a half assed wash - add some water to the lees / gick, swirl, wait 20 minutes for the trub to settle, use the tap to pour some of the watery stuff onto your new brew. Job done.

I did two batches (23L and a 12L) with the stuff that I got and both are tipping away nicely so I'm happy. I have two more in the fridge. Worth doing once I'd say.

Devi

So if I was to wash my yeast and put it in the fridge for a week, do I just take it out a couple of hours before I need to use it and throw it into the wort like I would the dry yeast? Is one jar enough to do 21lt?

Saruman

engrish? wrote: »

I made a brew the other day and just threw about 1/2 of the yeast cake from an old brew in on top of the new. It took off like a rocket and its been bubbling away ever since!

I have done this a few times and always with success but in my case, I pour half the yeast cake out of my glass carboy and then add the new wort.
No need to sanitise as I have just emptied beer to replace it with fresh wort so nothing else go in there.
Lazy but it works

Khannie

Devi wrote: »

So if I was to wash my yeast and put it in the fridge for a week, do I just take it out a couple of hours before I need to use it and throw it into the wort like I would the dry yeast? Is one jar enough to do 21lt?

I've been following the guidelines that I found and making a starter from mine. I only need a very small amount to do this. I get a litre of apple juice and put it in a sanitised 2L plastic bottle, add a smidgin of the yeast and shake the bejaysus out of it. 24 hours later it's kicking and I add it to my brew. I have gotten probably 10 brews out of my washed yeast so far and I have enough left for another 3-5.

howamidifferent

Khannie wrote: »

Here's a pic of mine after the initial wash and settle.

Are those baby formula bottles your using to store the yeast Khannie?

I'm thinking of trying to do similar but was wondering what flasks or tubes I could find or use cheaply to do this...

howamidifferent

Tube wrote: »

Washing yeast is fairly handy. Here's a write-up I did earlier.

http://nationalhomebrewclub.com/wiki/doku.php?id=washing_yeast

@Tube,
From the article you linked to you say "The test tubes shown in step 5 are easily gotten. Ask on the forum. They cost 20c each".

Do you have a link or source to these?

Khannie

howamidifferent wrote: »

Are those baby formula bottles your using to store the yeast Khannie?

They are indeed.

howamidifferent wrote: »

I'm thinking of trying to do similar but was wondering what flasks or tubes I could find or use cheaply to do this...

A sanitised glass jar would be fine. I just didn't have any except one of those flip top-ey ones which I'm still using (I used up the baby bottle ones first).

sharingan

http://www.hopandgrape.co.uk/public/catalog.asp?catid=YEA20088818