Decanting Yeast Starter

andymag · March 5, 2014, 3:48pm

With a lager, I now let my starter go on the stir plate for about 24 hours, then I place in my chest freezer for about two days at 50 degrees, decant the starter, then pitch to my wort (which would be as close to 50 degrees as possible).

With an ale I am not too sure about the practice being the same since I normally would be pitching my starter into wort that is about 65-70 degrees. Would I do the same process: Make the starter, crash at 50 degrees, decant, but then allow the decanted starter to warm up to room temp before pitching?

I used to just pitch the whole starter without decanting and had great results, but now as I try to master the process I would like to pitch decanted starters to avoid any off flavors in my finished product.

Thanks for your advice

denny · March 5, 2014, 4:04pm

I crash much colder…it goes a lot faster. And there’s no need to warm the yeast before pitching. There’s even some evidence that pitching colder yeast into warmer wort is beneficial for the yeast. I’ve been doing it that way for years and hundreds of batches and it works great.

andymag · March 5, 2014, 4:08pm

Thanks Denny!!!

dobe12 · March 5, 2014, 6:36pm

+1 to what Denny says. I cold crash in my fridge (40F?) for a day or two, decant and pitch. Don’t worry about it warming up. If the starter is small, like 1L or under, I don’t even bother decanting. It’s rare I have a starter that small, but on the rare occasions I do I just pitch the whole thing.

tjhatchit · March 5, 2014, 9:46pm

Cold Pitching Yeast, been doing that for many, many years.