Hydrate Yeast

Distilled water can harm the cells due to osmotic pressure. Given a choice, I'd pitch dry rather than rehydrate in distilled or RO water. A label that says "Spring Water" could have just about any mineral profile, i.e. it doesn't tell you anything about how soft it is. (I'm not familiar with Purified water.)

 

Next time you can add a bit of yeast nutrient to the water if distilled and that will get them off to a great start. If you plan on using dry yeast a lot you can get some GoFerm that is specifically for rehydration.

 

So what kind of water *SHOULD* I use?

 

Thanks! I'll try that, although I'm thinking of trying liquid on my next batch.

 

Tap water that hasn't had its salts removed. Or see if you can look up the water source for the Spring Water you're considering. It's more than likely okay, but I would recommend making sure.

 

Yeast nutrient containing DAP (many/most yeast nutrients?) would be bad for rehydration, because DAP at high concentrations is toxic.

ETA: I suppose you could use a tiny amount of DAP-containing nutrient, but then how much mineral content would there be?

 

I think I'm seeing why many just pitch it dry!!! I know when I started reading about rehydrating and was seeing stuff like "don't use this water and don't use that water... and make sure that your water has such-and-such" I just said "screw it" and threw the damn yeast in there dry and let them fend for themselves!

So... I'm thinking that liquid might be less of a headache? But there is the issue of doing a starter... I need to read up on that! Maybe I don't need to do that for a 2 gallon batch size??

 

Rehydration is an expense of time and effort that in my experience adds no discernible value with respect to fermentation and flavor of the final beer, and might even introduce contamination if you're not careful. Science says half the yeast cells die if you don't rehydrate. Economics says, that's okay, dry yeast is cheap, so use more. Experience says, it's cheap and effective to pitch it dry; it's so dang easy, a caveman could do it and still make fantastic beer every single friggin time.

 

http://brulosophy.com/2014/09/15/sprinkled-vs-rehydrated-dry-yeast-exbeeriment-results/
Above link contained a little extra

 

Bingo!

Since there's twice as many as you need in a single packet, this is not a meaningful factoid, even if it's true (I'm not saying it's not)

While that's true, see my previous comment

Comments like that will get you flamed in most forums, including here, though the discussion has been remarkably civil so far (maybe everybody's still punchy from the last one! ). That's when you ask yourself why you bothered to comment. People have opinions. Some of those opinions are based on nothing more than intuition, the opiners not being swayed by contrary evidence (think Climate Change).

 

I too am a 2-gallon batch size kind of a guy. A half pack of dry will be good enough for most beers except lagers or really strong beers with OG > 1.075 or so. Then I'd use a whole pack. Been doing this for many years and the yeast almost always takes off within 8-12 hours, except for stuff like BRY-97 that's a known lagger for 36 hours.

With liquid yeast, you really don't need a starter except like above, maybe for lagers and strong beers. Freshness also matters -- make sure the yeast wasn't manufactured more than 4-5 months ago. Otherwise, think about making a small starter.

 

Flame away, I'm not afraid. If opinions are worth a dime a dozen, then mine are still worth about 2 cents.

 

Rut roh, I see a triple rebuttal coming!?!

Cheers!

 

I see an idiot making the same joke only he understands over and over again.

 

The easiest way to avoid this dilemma is to never use dry yeast. Especially S-05.

 

I love you guys, you guys are so cool.

 

Wow... the "fermentation" is going strong on this thread. May need to use a blow-off tube!!!

 

S-05 is my regular yeast, been using it almost exclusively for 3 years. I have pitched dry, I have pitched after dehydrating. I honestly can't see any difference between two. Some packs of dry yeast state to dehydrate while others say to just pitch dry. Try a few one way & then the other to see how your results vary. Relax, don't worry, have a homebrew! At the end of the day, you are making beer.

 

I enjoyed the read on this. I think it could have been better if they would have brewed a Munich Hells. The recipe for their Dunkel had a lot of flavors between the malt and hops that could mask what the yeast was doing.

 

@Brewday posted a link to their site in the Fermentation temps thread (thanks BTW), I spent 1 night going thru all of their experiments. Very interesting reads