Yeast Cake



This is a 6.5 gallon fermentor, the Krausen clogged up the first airlock and it had to be switched out with a second one.

 The Pale Tranquility seems to be humming along nicely now. This was the first time that I have attempted to pitch a new batch of wort onto an existing Yeast Cake of the same strain.

This particular one was WLP001, California Ale yeast left over from my second batch of Sky Blue (The Blue Moon Clone). Technically I didn't pitch it into the same fermentor as it had the leftover ring of Krausen still clinging to the inside. Instead I used a sanitized container and funnel to transfer the existing yeast slurry out. The funnel has a built in screen so it was able to keep left over trub from the Sky Blue from intruding into the new wort.

It took about 30 hours for the yeast to take off, but once it did it took off with a vengence. Previous uses of WLP001 never achieved this level of vigor. Within 12 hours of the first signs of activity the airlock was semi-clogged due to the krausen filling up all the headspace. This one probably could have used a blow off tube, if I had known in advance that it would have performed like this then I would have set it up. Either way, it didn't make any mess at all and is happily churning away.

My next planned beer is probably going to be an Oktoberfest so I won't be able to use this same yeast right out of the fermentor. I will happily wash this batch though and store it for later use.