I brewed yesterday but had to hurry towards the end because it took longer than I thought and I had a time commitment for early evening with friends.
In short, I didn’t add all the yeast from my WLP 013 to 5.5 gals of `1.060 wort. I had the tube at room temp. about 65 F and added to the wort which I placed in a large tub of 60 F water. I shook the tube, sanitized the outside and poured it in. But today, I noticed the tube still felt a bit heavy and there is still some sludge of yeast remaining in the tube.
It’s been about 24 hours with the fermenter sitting in a 60 F water bath, and I’m seeing little if any signs of active fermentation.
Should I wait 24 hours and see what happens?
Warm the yeast tube and mix the contents with some wort from the fermenter to help liquify the remaining contents of the yeast tube then pitch it?
Or hydrate some dry yeast and pitch it?
Suggestions please and thanks in advance for your help.
Pitch the yeast in the vial if it had been kept in a sanitary condition. Did you use a good pitch rate calculator to see if the one vial of yeast, without a starter, would be sufficient for a 1.060 wort?
I assume it’s a bitter or english ale of some sort so maybe wait and see…48-72 hours? Underpitching would likely increase esters so depending on how much character you want the ale to have it could work out. If you use good brewing practices then you’ll be fine waiting that long.
If you’re the nervous sort or you wanted a cleaner ale profile which your 60 degree ferm temp suggests, then you might want to pitch a pack of dry yeast. Everyone will suggest 05 and it will work well but I’d use Notty. You’ll still get some english ale charater from it and it’s a workhorse. If you rehydrate it you’ll get fermentation in a couple hours.
