What does everyone do regarding yeast nutrient? I have rarely, if ever, used yeast nutrient at the homebrew level. I always pitch a healthy amount of yeast (per Mr. Malty) and properly aerate the wort. Never had attenuation issues that I believe were caused by pitch rate or aeration. Is there any reason to believe that my current practice wouldn’t translate to the commercial level? Incidentally, we are going to invest in a 30bbl system with 4 x 60bbl fermentors.
I’ve read a few threads over at Probrewer.com where there seem to be equal numbers of brewers who use products like YeastX and those who just rely on proper pitch rates and O2. It also seems like there are brewers who avoid YeastX because they don’t know the chemical composition and don’t want unknowns in their beer (which seems like a valid concern to me).
I think the biggest difference would be that pro-brewers are more likely to re-use their yeast, so they’d want to take extra steps to make sure they are harvesting healthy yeast. Of course, homebrewers who harvest yeast would want to do the same, but more homebrewers are one and done with yeast.
I suppose yeast might react differently to the large scale environment too.
In addition to the pro angle, I grow my yeast up from slants and when I started using nutrient (Wyeast), it made for a very noticeable improvement in getting stepped up to pitching size.
When I started I had an grand plans how I will propagate my yeast from plates and slants. I have done it at home and it worked quite well.
Reality was that I could never grew it out of 10 gallons. I really needed 100 gallons starter.
Now I just buy a 5 liter pitchable slurry.
I need 10 liters for my volume (lagers). So day one I brew 5 BBL -->> pitch the 5 liters in and day 2 brew another 5 BBL on top of it. Last time I bought yeast was in May last year and I am on 9-th generation. Still going strong.
I disagree, I would be growing yeast from slants if I had a microbiologist on board. That’s my goal at some point in time. I’d also like to hire a real master-brewer at some point in time too. The more people you have to kick around the better!
I use the Wyeast nutrient. It’s cheap and effective. I think you will find on both homebrew and pro level that a little nutrient will help speed up fermentations and help remove or prevent some sulfur compounds. I do agree that it is even more necessary if you are harvesting yeast regularly.
And, fwiw I use pure o2 fro aeration. I’ve experimented with inline aeration but prefer to aerate the entire volume. Next big purchase (before microbiologist!) is DO meter.
I use nutrient in big beers, anything fermented very warm (e.g. saisons) and meads. I tend not to use it in anything else. Of course, I’m not brewing professionally, either.
