Vitality starter

The Homebrew Forum

Help Support The Homebrew Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

JonBrew

Landlord.
Joined
Jun 5, 2014
Messages
677
Reaction score
356
Location
Perth, Scotland
Anyone tried using a vitality starter for their fermentations? I did this on a batch yesterday, a Belgian Dark Strong starting at 1080, and the yeast has taken off like a rocket; I had signs of active fermentation within 3 hours of pitching.

I read about it recently on the Brulosophy site.

http://brulosophy.com/2015/06/29/ye...e-cell-count-vs-vitality-exbeeriment-results/

Essentially, instead of the conventional yeast starter which you start days ahead of your brew day, with the vitality starter, on the day you brew you make up 500ml of DME starter wort, pitch your yeast of choice and sit it on your stir plate for about 4 hours and then pitch the whole lot into the wort when you're ready.

The idea is that whilst the starter wort is being continuously oxygenated on the stir plate, this allows the yeast to build up it's cell strength/vitality with all the stuff it needs to carry out the fermentation. Then, as the yeast has already utilised all the oxygen in the starter, you don't aerate your wort prior to pitching the yeast.

Apparently the technique was developed by Coors. I suppose it's perhaps a bit like pitching a regular starter at high krausen. I think this is quite a cool technique as, if you have an impromptu brew day, it lets you pitch 'active' fresh liquid yeast that day, rather than pitching fresh yeast straight out the vial/smack-pack or using dried yeast. It also purportedly lets you pitch with lower than the recommended healthy cell count that might ordinarily be require (at least that was the focus of the Brulosophy experiment).

Anyway, just thought I'd share. Will update with the results of the finished beer once it's done.
 
It works well in my experience/opinion. Gets fermentation underway quickly and the beers I've made with this method have turned out just fine.

One issue I have heard is that apparently the yeast aren't in the best shape for harvesting and pitching into another batch with this method but I can't remember the exact reason for this or where I read it.
 
Have you tried it with dried yeast?

I'm not that bothered about harvesting, but if it's an easy way to guarantee a strong fermentation without any other wort oxygenation I'd be very interested to try.
 
Have you tried it with dried yeast?

I'm not that bothered about harvesting, but if it's an easy way to guarantee a strong fermentation without any other wort oxygenation I'd be very interested to try.

Never tried it with dry yeast. I'm sure it would work fine but I don't know if I'd ever bother. If I'm ever using dried yeast I'd normally I just direct pitch unless the manufacturer specifically recommends rehydrating.
 
I was more tempted to try it to get the yeast well oxygenated, having had a couple of stalled fermentations, and having scratched up the inside of a fv using a beer paddle on a drill.

If I can do a 3 hour vitality starter then just chuck it straight into work without having to oxygenate then that sounds like a good option.
 
Back
Top