Starter is going to kick off my winter brew season

Unfortunately NB was out of Fast Pitch so I had to resort to an old fashion starter. It’s not like I never boiled some extract to make one before but the FP makes it easier for five gallons. Anything larger and it starts getting expensive. My starter vessel is a wine carafe the previous condo owner left with foil over the top.

Just getting settled in to our winter home and I have three kits to do. The Brickwarmer is first. Rushing it a little to be ready for Christmas but with Kveik yeast and no practical way to control ferm temps it should finish quickly and then into a keg with priming sugar it will go. Getting CO2 around here is a major PIA so I try to conserve so priming is better than force. Making sure the tank is off when not in use helps too, just in case.

Have fun! I’ve not used the fast pitch yet but I can see the benefits. My DME turned to hard candy from the humidity during the power outages. I’ll have to buy new soon.

It does look like a nice product. Too rich for my blood though!

Have you tried to put it in a pot to heat with water? May break the sugar molecules apart… ? Sneezles61

$2.50 to save me an hour to make a starter is well worth my money. Now if they could just get it back in stock. . .

:beers:
Rad

I could try that…apparently DME is hygroscopic, a fancy thesaurus long hair word for soaks up moisture…

I had a partial bag DME that turned into a rock. I chipped off small pieces to put on a scale to get the correct amount and then pulverized the pieces inside a zip lock bag with a heavy Pyrex measuring cup. Took some extra stirring for the small bits left to dissolve but it worked.

What in the world!?!? An Hour!?!

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Agreed…put some water in pan… heat it up till boiling…stir in dme and let it cool…5 min tops for such a small amount of water.

wwhhhaatt? you know me? I’ve long hair… Sneezles61

Double bag it and beat with a mallet

Oh great… Weird Al Yankit… beat it!! a parody from Micheal Jackson!! Sneezles61
The musician… not the brew man…

Got it done and it’s bubbling away this morning. The beer not the starter that is.

I agree with @radagast the small investment in Fast Pitch is worth it. When I’m doing 20 gallons I make up more than small batch brewers brew just for a starter and it would blow an entire 4 pack so extract it is.

BTW Midwest appears to be out of it too.

When I start a new liquid yeast I’ll brew a 2 or three gallon beer then repitch the yeast to a a 10 gallon and still have some to save. I don’t do starters

So do you decant the wort from three gallons? When I’m making my big starters they are sometimes that big. I just swirl it around and divide it up in the fermenters. I do save some back to reuse.

It’s not worth anymore because it’s fermented so it’s beer. I’ll usually make a similar style that I plan to brew then crash and rack off the beer. Generally I’ll bottle condition the beer with domino dots since it’s a smaller amount

Maybe what your asking is can you transfer the beer before it finished so you can get the yeast early. Yes you can

Well, go down to basement, get DME and nutrient, 10 mins to boil 1.25 L water, stir in DME, boil 15 min, pour in flask, icebath in sink another 10-15 mins. Eh, I’m not usually in a hurry and am doing something else at the time so maybe an hour was a bit exxagerated but still, pop a tab dump a can and a can of water and go was awfully nice. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: Sadly, they’ve been out since like May at this point so I doubt it’s coming back.

:beers:
Rad

No I usually pitch the entire thing before it finishes while the yeast is still active.

I rack active fermentations often when adding fruit or something to a secondary no big deal. Good time to add some dry hops or make a mini version of your 20 gallon and compare the bottle condition to the keg conditioned. It’s all good