I am going to make the Black IPA which recommends a yeast starter. I cleaned the yeast from my Chinook IPA kit and have the yeast stored in jars. I also picked up the wyeast 1272 for the Black IPA kit.
My question is: if I cleaned the yeast and have it stored in jars do I even need the wyeast 1272 if I make a starter with the cleaned yeast?
I am confused about which yeast needs to be used. Originally, I planned to do a yeast starter with the cleaned yeast and then pitch that with the 1272 in the fermenter. Is this the correct way to make a yeast starter, by using a smack pack and doing a starter with previous yeast (so not making a starter with the 1272)?
Or…
Could I just do a starter with the yeast I cleaned (and did not need to buy the wyeast 1272)?
My understandings is that starters just increase the cell count of yeast for higher gravity beers.
I know the different styles of yeast may create different flavors but just want to understand the correct procedure for a yeast starter.
A starter would typically start with a smack pack, to build to pitchable cell counts. You could also pitch the harvested slurry, with or without a starter. Generally one wouldn’t use both.
Check the slurry tab in the MrMalty calculator. If you pitched the IPA less than a few weeks ago, you should be fine using the rinsed slurry without a starter.
The yeast I saved is wyeast 1056 from the Chinook IPA kit.
Well since I purchased the smack pack for the Black IPA I might as well use that as my starter for the beer. I will save the harvested yeast for another beer.
Im glad to know that I do not need to buy the smack packs in the future and the harvested yeast will suffice for fermenting higher gravity beers. I thought you needed the smack pack and needed to do a starter for the harvested yeast because a smack pack did not contain enough yeast cells.
So I should just make a starter with the 1272 and save my harvested yeast for another beer, correct?
Thanks, I will use the 1272 and save the harvested yeast for another beer.
According to Mr. Malty, I need to make a pretty big starter since the OG for the black ipa is 1.075. Would it be ok to use a small pickle jar as a yeast starter or do I need to use a bigger container?
Without checking, I’d say you’re looking at about a 2 L (shaken) starter. As long as it can be sanitized and hold that much with a little head space, you can use whatever you want.
Awesome, I will see if it holds enough the amount of water needed. If it does not, I will just use one of the growlers I have from Granite City. It seems people have mentioned using them for yeast starters.
