Digorging

[HogieWan]

Here's a link (http://home.howstuffworks.com/winemaking7.htm) that describes how yeast is removed from a champagne bottle after bottle conditioning. It's probably more trouble than it's worth, but I might want to try it for a few bottles.

What do you think?

[Drink to much]

I have not yet tried to recycle yeast, maybe I am afraid of ruining all my hard work being a tight a**. I will eventually try it to see what happens and will probably wish I had done so sooner.

[guildofevil]

You're right, it is a lot of trouble to remove sediment from the bottles.

"Drink to much" (Shouldn't that be "Drink too much"?); I don't think HogieWan is talking about using this method to harvest yeast for reuse.

Just pitching your next brew on the yeast cake of the last one is the easiest way of doing that. I have had success with this method.

You can also culture and step up yeast, harvested from the dregs of bottle conditioned beers, after you have poured it into a glass. This is how I got my Chimay yeast.

Séan

[I'mRocketMan]

Sean- How long can you keep the harvested Chimay yeast?

[guildofevil]

I'm still experimenting but this is what I have so far.

I harvested yeast from 4 or 5 bottles of Chimay Brown/Red and stepped it up to 3 litres or so.

It fermented out my first batch quickly and the sample I tasted when I was racking to secondary, on Tuesday night, had a definite Chimay character to it.

I pitched my next batch of beer right onto the yeast cake 30 mins. later and added a little yeast nutrient. It took off again but slower this time and it has been much less vigorous since.

It's obviously tired at this stage. I checked on it this morning and it seems to have slowed to a crawl. I didn't have time to take a hydrometer reading, so I won't know what the situation is until I get home from work.

If it's not fermenting down properly I might add champaign yeast prior to bottle conditioning.

I probably won't use the same culture twice again but since Betty and I are both fond of Chimay, that shouldn't be a problem ;)

From what I hear, the stepped up, harvested yeast will keep in the fridge for a couple of weeks but I can't speak from personal experience here.


UPDATE: I wronged the poor little Chimay yeast cells, they must have been doing a good job without me noticing.

Went home and got my hydrometer out. The gravity was 1.006. Might explain why activity had slowed!

This is less than 48 hours since it was pitched. This yeast is really good.

Séan

[HogieWan]

If you read the link, it describes how the sedient is removed from bottle-conditioned champagne bottles. I was thinking of trying it with larger botles of a barleywine or something.

[Drink to much]

Originally posted by guildofevil
You're right, it is a lot of trouble to remove sediment from the bottles.

"Drink to much" (Shouldn't that be "Drink too much"?); I don't think HogieWan is talking about using this method to harvest yeast for reuse.

Just pitching your next brew on the yeast cake of the last one is the easiest way of doing that. I have had success with this method.

You can also culture and step up yeast, harvested from the dregs of bottle conditioned beers, after you have poured it into a glass. This is how I got my Chimay yeast.

Séan

Yes it should be "too", I am a fine example of the American school system and should have caught that. I do not know how to change it so I guess I am stuck with it.