My first yeast starter, well my second...

You can call me ignorant or stupid, but I have never made a yeast starter in my homebrewing career, well... never made one up until last week. Actually, when I first entered the world of homebrewing no one ever told me that I had to make a yeast starter, I was told just to pitch a vial of White Labs into my 5 gallon batches. Well, that didn't convert to well when I started brewing 10 gallon batches, and many of my beers took a fair amount of time to begin fermenting and were finishing too high in gravity, as well as displaying off flavors.

After listening to Jamil Zainasheff on the Brewing Network I soon discovered that making a yeast starter could dramatically improve the quality of my liquid bread concoctions. So for my first brew, Me So Corny, I decided to try out a yeast starter, and to my surprise making a yeast starter really isn't that hard and it definitely improved the fermentation start-up time. We'll soon know its affects on the flavor and total fermentation time once the beer finishes fermenting. Using the information on Jamil's website and his Mr. Malty Pitching Rate Calculator I was able to calculate the correct amount of yeast starter needed for my next brew, an American Trippel.

Here is exactly what I did...

On his site Jamil says to aim for a target gravity of 1.030 - 1.040, which is about a ratio of 10ml. of water to 1 gram of DME (Dry Malt Extract). For the American Trippel, which has a starting gravity of 1.083, I need a 2000ml. starter. Before I even started my starter I made sure to clean and sanitize everything that would come in contact with the starter. Once I was sure everything was clean and sanitized, I went on preparing the yeast starter.

To meet the target starter amount, I added 2200ml. of water to my brew kettle and brought it up to a gentle boil. Once the water had reached boiling point I added my pre-measured DME, along with a teaspoon of Yeast Nutrients to the kettle and gently boiled for a total of 15 minutes.

At the 15 minute mark I cut the heat and moved the kettle over to the sink where I had an ice bath ready to cool it down to pitching temperature, about 70*F. Once the starter wort was down to the desired temperature I poured it into a spare growler I had laying around and gave it a good shake. After the shaking, I poured my two vials of White Labs WLP530 Abbey Ale Yeast into the starter wort and shook it once more for good measure, then capped the growler with a piece of aluminum foil.I'll let the yeast starter grow at about 70F - 72F.

I do not have a stir plate, so I like to give the yeast a nice gentle swirl every hour, which is recommended by other homebrews who do not have a stir plate. Jamil states, "I like to pitch starters while they're still very active and as soon as the bulk of reproduction is finished, usually within 8 to 18 hours." I pitched my first yeast starter at the 18 hour mark and have had great results thus far, so I plan to do the exact same thing with this batch of brew.