Yeast Starter

To make a yeast starter begin by popping your liquid yeast 2 days prior to brewing. Once the yeast packet has swollen boil up your starter wort. The correct ratio of dried malt extract to water is :

      2 tablespoons dried malt per cup of water
                                 or

       1 pound of dried malt per gallon of water

We recommend a 1 pint to 1 quart starter for ales and a 2 quart starter for lagers. Boil the water and dried malt for 5 minutes to sanitize it and dissolve the powder. After 5 minutes of boiling, add it to your starter jar (warm glass first). Immerse starter jar in cold water to cool it to 60-70 deg. F.. Once wort is cooled add yeast. Allow 1 day for starter to begin fermenting. Ferment starters at room temp for both ales and lagers. Once fermentation has reached its peak or the starter has fermented out the starter is ready. Attempt to use the starter within 1 week.

Ales: Brew beer and cool batch to 60-75 deg F.. Pour about half of wort out of starter jar and into a glass. Smell and taste some of this 'beer'. It should taste like yeasty flat beer. If it tastes sour, lactic or rancid do not use it. If starter wort tastes O.K. swirl starter jar to get all yeast off bottom of starter jar and pitch into batch. Fermentation should be evident within 12-24 hrs.

Lagers: Brew beer and cool batch to 47-55 deg F. Put fermenting or fermented yeast starter in 45-55 deg temp range with batch of beer. Allow both the batch of beer and fermented starter wort to both cool to 47-55 deg. F.. Once yeast and batch have achieved lager temperatures, pour about 3/4 of wort out of starter jar and into a glass. Smell and taste some of this 'beer'. It should taste like yeasty flat beer. If it tastes sour, lactic or rancid do not use it. If starter wort tastes O.K. swirl starter jar to get all yeast off bottom of starter jar and pitch into batch. Fermentation should be evident within 24-48 hrs.