I’m planning my first high OG beer using a yeast starter. Is there any benefit of harvesting during the peak high Kräusen state? If so, how would I implement this, by skimming off the Krausen? I don’t want to include the starter wort in my pitch.
You can chill the starter which would drop out the yeast, and pour off the left over wort.
But, I would recommend pitching everything including the starter wort. If the yeast is already active, and in it’s growth phase … why would you want to stop that?
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Not to mention that even after cold crashing there will still be a lot of yeast suspended in the wort.
I’m concerned that pitching a couple of quarts of starter wort would affect the flavor profile of my batch wort.
A couple of qts? How big a batch are you making? OG?
Don’t forget what Charlie Papazian said… Relax, don’t worry, and have a homebrew.
I’m brewing a 5-gal. batch barleywine and shooting for 1.085 OG. In the podcast listed below, pitching either multiple packets or pitching a large starter was recommended for high OG’s. So, I plan to follow this advice.
Brewing High Gravity Beers with John Palmer - BeerSmith Podcast 33
FWIW, I just made a 1.084 BDSA and used 2 packs of 1762 in a 1 qt. SNS starter. Pitched the whole thing. An approach you could consider is to make a batch of lower gravity beer and use that slurry for your BW.
One technique I’ve seen my friends do is brew a different full sized batch with the yeast you want to use in the barleywine, then harvest the left over yeast, or just pitch your BW right on top of the yeast cake. Takes a lot of planning, but you’ll get a bunch of yeast for your BW.
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I’ve brewed Ordinary Bitter, then used the yeast cake for a BW. For lagers I’ve done a 5 gallon Leichtbier and used the cake for 10 gallons of Heller Bock.
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I’ve done all the above and had success. I recently made a 3-liter starter of Wyeast 1084 (Irish Ale), cold crashed it, saved a vial of slurry for future use, then today, after chilling 5.5 gallons of Irish Red wort, I put about a pint of wort in the flask with the bulk of slurry while the wort continued to cool. By the time my fermenter hit my pitching temp target (61F) the yeast in the flask was at high kräusen so I pitched the entire contents without worrying about days-old oxidized beer going in. Two hours later, I have visible activity in the fermenter, a very healthy pitch rate, and a full vial of very fresh yeast in my fridge. I think I’ll try this on my next barley wine with a bigger initial starter. Different yeast of course.
I always use a starter, 100 grams DME in 1 liter of water, slow boil for 10 mins and cooled to pitch temp. You lose 100 ml or so when complete but have dumped the whole lot for many HG beers and don’t worry about the added volume because there isn’t any.
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