I’m going to be brewing a higher gravity ale than I’ve tried before (OG 1.088), and plan to use a starter. When I used the calculator on the Mr. Malty site, it said to use 2 yeast packets, but a friend of mine says I really only need one. According to the calculator for 5 gallons at 1.088, I need 299 billion cells, or 2 vials/packs in a 2 liter starter. Am I wasting money by going with 2 packs?
If you pull the growth factor slider to the right it will calculate the starter size for a single pack, in this case 5 L. Based on the numbers you gave, though, you have it set to “simple starter”. I’d suggest using “intermittent shaking”, unless for some reason you can’t shake the starter every once in a while. That gets you down to one pack in a 3 L starter.
So how do I get a starter bigger than 2 liters? I’ve got a 2 liter and a 1 liter Erlenmeyer flask, so I’ve got 3 liters of total volume.
Sounds like you have a stirplate. Just adjust the “type of starter” to stirplate and it decreases to 1.9L. Which will still be tight for a 2L flask.
Or, if you don’t have a stir plate, go get a 1-gallon jug of cheap wine. Make the wine into Sangria, and use the jug to make your starter. You might even be able to use the wine jug with a stir plate - it works with mine. This is just a 1.75-liter starter, but it will work up to 4 liters in the jug.