Pitch Rate and New Yeast

While most of this information has been covered in previous posts, we have a new product on the shelf that we wanted to highlight, and it is always good to go over things that are important. There is a new player in the liquid yeast scene. GigaYeast, Inc. "laboratory was opened in July 2011 to create perfect.... And by perfect we mean the right yeast, the right pitch rate and no detectable contamination.”

We have picked up GigaYeast as a product for a couple of reasons; One, they offer some yeast strands that are not available from both Wyeast and White Labs, and Two, they provide a real pitchable yeast for the consumer without the need for a starter, for most 5 gallon batches of ale.

Putting the correct amount of yeast in your beer can be one of the easiest ways to eliminate off-flavors. However, it is probably one of the most common oversights by the home brewer. Most people like the variety available in liquid yeast, and feel like it is a better product than the dry counterpart, but the fact is, the large Wyeast pack and the standard Whitelabs vial, contain about half the necessary yeast for clean start to fermentation for a 5%, 5 gallon batch of ale. Doing a yeast starter is a great way to use liquid yeast correctly, but many beginners are intimidated by them. Giga Yeast has twice as many yeast cells at the time of packaging as their liquid yeast counterparts, which is ideal for many beers.

We of course recommend figuring out what your correct pitch rate should be for any beer before adding your yeast. While pitching yeast is a fairly straight forward process, there is a bit of mathematical magic happening in the background that has to do with keeping your yeast cells happy and healthy. But, since math is hard and magic doesn't exist, let's make this as easy as possible, first we need to find how many degrees Plato your beer wort will be. Like specific gravity, Plato is just a measure of density, and approximating Plato can be done by taking the numbers after the decimal of your Original Gravity (O.G.) and dividing them by 4. So, an O.G. of 1.048 would be 12 degrees Plato (1.080 would be 20 degrees Plato). Once you know how

to find Plato you can easily find your pitch rate using one of the below:

Find Plato, double that number, add a zero after it, and then say billion after that... it's easy. “My recipe is going to have a 1.048 O.G, so 48 divided by 4 is 12, double that is 24, or 240... Billion”. Subtract 25% for ales, or add 25% for lagers.

Or, an even shorter version; calculate Plato, then times that number by 15. That is it for ales. Double that number for Lagers.

Sanitation Iodophor vs. Star-San

A question we get a lot in the store is why to use a no rinse sanitizer, and whether or not the One Step or PBW is a sanitizer at all. So, I thought I would cover those very common questions.

Unlike other posts, I will be slanting this towards the products we sell in the store and giving my opinion based on what I have use, seen, and read about. It seems there are neverending threads on forums on whether or not Bicarbonate cleansers such as PBW, One-Step, and B-Brite work as a sanitizer, but for the purposes of this post, I will just say they are NOT sanitizers. Yes, it used to be. Yes, it kills microbes. Yes, people use it as a sanitizer successfully. But it is not classified as a sanitizer any longer because it doesn’t kill enough microbes. They also leave a film and granules behind that I wouldn’t really want in my beer or wine, which means you need to rinse it… and if you are rinsing you are reintroducing microbes.

So, we recommend treating your equipment like a commercial kitchen treats their dishing and cookware. Clean (with cleanser), Rinse (with water), Sanitize (no rinse sanitizer).

Since One-Step, PBW, and B-Brite are virtually the same thing and are all really good at removing organic material, you could go with whatever one you would like with similar results, but there are a couple popular no rinse sanitizers that are fairly different, so here is an over vew of Both:

Iodophor

This is an iodine based sanitizer that is great for home brewers. There is no real Iodine smell, and if diluted properly, should not affect the taste of your beer either, but if you have a severe iodine allergy, I would probably stay away from it. The main benefit of this product is price. It is a bit cheaper than Star-Stan.

Dilution: 1oz to 5 gallons

Contact Time: 1 minute

Dry Time: None

Min Cost/Oz: $.66

Star-San

Built specifically for the home brewer, this product is acid-based and uses a low PH to kill microbes. The diluted solution will quickly degrade in the presence of beer (wort) and break down into yeast nutrient. It is a bit more expensive, but you can keep the diluted solution around for several weeks (as long as the PH says below a 3) and reuse it, which makes up for the added cost. This product also produces a lot of foam, which turns some people off, but in my experience has never caused any off flavors or issues with fermentation.

Dilution: 1oz to 5 gallons

Contact Time: 30 Seconds

Dry Time: None

Min Cost/Oz: $.70

We suggest trying both products to see which one works best for you, but because of the longevity we give the edge to Star-San.

In full disclosure there are other products, such as Caustic soda, sodium hydroxide and lye which are a VERY effective cleaners for organic solids but rather dangerous to use without protection and not very friendly to the environment.