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Author Topic: Under pitching and then Re Pitching  (Read 1915 times)

Offline allenjoseph5

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Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« on: August 25, 2016, 03:15:49 pm »
I planning on brewing a Hefeweizen this weekend. The LHBS only had one packet of the Wyeast 3068 that was a little old. Even with a starter, I will be under pitching.  Which I'm not too upset about, because I'm hoping for a lot of banana esters. I am worried about any other undesirable flavors though.

With the starter, I'll be at about 0.41M cells / mL / °P.  Or about 100 billion short.

I also bought a vial of WLP380. Which is more clove than banana. Again I'm hoping for lots of banana.

So my plan is to under pitch with the wyeast, which should increase the banana esters. And then re pitching with the WLP380 to clean up any unwanted off flavors. Does this sound reasonable?  I'm still pretty new to homebrewing.


Offline Stevie

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Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« Reply #1 on: August 25, 2016, 03:28:28 pm »
You can try a 1 liter shaken not stirred stater pitched full volume at high krausen. One of the main proponents of this method states that initial cell count is way less important with this method. I can attest it works well. I still have trouble with adding the full volume, but the results are good enough to ease that concern.

Offline HoosierBrew

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Re: Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« Reply #2 on: August 25, 2016, 03:35:44 pm »
You can try a 1 liter shaken not stirred stater pitched full volume at high krausen. One of the main proponents of this method states that initial cell count is way less important with this method. I can attest it works well. I still have trouble with adding the full volume, but the results are good enough to ease that concern.


+1. I'm not in love with pitching the whole volume either but the process works as advertised. Won't be doing it for lagers any time soon, but for average strength ales it's a good method.
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Offline Joe Sr.

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Re: Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« Reply #3 on: August 25, 2016, 03:41:10 pm »
I did this for a lager recently that I fermented at +/- 50F.  It came out quite well, though I am admittedly not a regular lager brewer.

Nice and crisp and clean.  Well attenuated.  I was certain I had wildly underpitched and (once I realized the actual C to F conversion) that I had started fermentation too cold.  It took a couple days to get rocking but it rocked.

EDIT:  By "this" I mean the SNS starter, not repitching another yeast.  Just realized belatedly I may not have been clear.
« Last Edit: August 26, 2016, 08:42:00 am by Joe Sr. »
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Offline ynotbrusum

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Re: Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« Reply #4 on: August 25, 2016, 06:06:10 pm »
I even used the Northern Brewer Fast Pitch with the SNS method last weekend and the beer took off as quickly as I have ever seen.  A very light ale - Grodziskie.  It is starting to drop clear today, day 5 at 62F with 029.
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Offline kramerog

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Re: Under pitching and then Re Pitching
« Reply #5 on: August 26, 2016, 12:21:59 am »
Most of the flavor is created early in the fermentation so you could pitch the WLP380 when the beer is at high krausen.  Alternatively, you could hold off until the Wyeast 3068 is finished and see how the beer tastes.  If you detect diacetyl you would then make a 1 gal batch of beer and pitch the Wyeast 3068 into it and then mix the 1-gal batch with the original batch at high krausen.  I don't have enough experience with hefeweizen to recommend one approach vs the other.  I don't have experience with the SNS starter method either.