BeerBorg

I'm trying to wash some 830 but what is the yeast? My process from all my ale yeasties is to pour into the glass one gallon jar from the fermentor. I pour off the beer after it settles down/clears. I put clean (previously boiled/cooled water) on top and shake for a few minutes. I then let it settle for 20 minutes and pour off the water and yeast into another clear bottle. Into the fridge for a day or 2, then pour off the stained water, add fresh water, shake/sit for 20 again then draw off the yeastie water leaving most solids behind. A few more days in the fridge and I usually end up with some nice, creamy colored yeast with little to no trub.

Here's my problem. With this lager yeast, how is that process? I do the first as above, pour off the beer, add fresh water, shaky-shake, 20 minutes pour off the water/flocculant yeasties, I think. I let this settle in fridge 3 days, then wash again, pour off dirty water, put fresh in, shake-shook, 20 minutes pour. BUT, it looks to me like the yeast settles first, before the trub? The bottom layer, what I'm used to seeing as trub is a nice creamy white layer with the brown trub (?) layer now on top? I'm not seeing any white layer over the top (second) dark trub layer? Am I doing something wrong? I'm new with trying to wash my lager yeast.

That can happen. Sometimes you can even get yeast at the bottom, trub in the middle, and more yeast on top. It is not just a lager yeast thing, it can happen with ale yeasts too, it depends on the yeast flocculation vs. the types of solids remaining and other things (temps might affect it, wort density might affect it, all sorts of things).

You know what I would do in your case? Just leave it alone and call it done. Don't worry about that little bit of trub in there. Just use the stuff like it is.

I'm fairly certain that I've read that both Denny and Jamil will pitch some trub like that and not worry about it, some people (even one of them I believe if I remember reading things in the past right) have just put actual trub in a jar and re-used it with great success (as in... washing... blah too much work LOL).

So... RDWHAHB I say.

I don't wash yeast, I just save trub.

John Sand wrote:I don't wash yeast, I just save trub.

^^This^^ If I'm saving after fermentation.
Most of what I do now is to overbuild my first starter by 100 billion cells and save that to make another starter with. That way I'm always starting with clean yeast.

Inkleg wrote:

John Sand wrote:I don't wash yeast, I just save trub.

^^This^^ If I'm saving after fermentation.
Most of what I do now is to overbuild my first starter by 100 billion cells and save that to make another starter with. That way I'm always starting with clean yeast.

Ok, I won't worry bout it. I'm going to do a Munich Helles tomorrow on next day so I will just pitch what I have. Sometimes I over-thunk it me thunks.

I've yet to figure out how to measure yeast count. The cream layer in a one gallon jug is about 3/4 inch thick. Any idea how many cells that is? That should be enough to do up a 6 gallon batch me thunks.

In technical terms, that's "A Lot" of yeast. "Mucho" in metric.

You need a microscope (40x lens and 10x eyepiece), methylene blue, hemocytometer (grid slide), and pipets.

http://www.whitelabs.com/beer/cell-coun ... -testing-0

Most people don't do this for homebrewing.

Finally, used this yeast. Washed it down again into a quart jar, ended up with atleast a 2 inch layer of yeast. I dumped it into a Munich Helles batch. It's in a 50 degree cooler holding a good steady temp. I wonder if I'm too cold? It is fermenting, took 2 days to take off. It has been 8 days and it is still going, nice krausen, bubbling away but it has bubbled about 1 per 2-3 seconds since it started. And, it's still going at same rate. My first lager, does lager yeast go this slow?

Sounds normal for washed lager yeast.
I plan to ferment at 48* in a few weeks with WLP830 so you're good there.