yeast starter, am i doing this right?

You want to hit that "grab from above" button to pull in the number of viable cells you have (~45 billion). A 1L starter in a 2L flask should be doable and would eliminate the need for a second step for the starter.

 

A couple of errors that will work in your favor:

You are pitching a full pack of yeast that is 57 days old . . . enter "liquid pack" of 1.0, this will give you 60 billion yeast to start with. For a saison (ale) use the default target pitch rate of 0.75 (millions of cells/ml/degree Plato). Wort volume is what you intend to put in the fermentor, I use 5.25 gallons. This will give you a target of 167 billion cells.

In part Two: Enter the size of starter that will give you 167B cells with shaking selected. In this case, 1.5L yields 168 billion cells, so you are good to go with a single step. I find 1.5 liters in a 2.0 flask is about the limit, enough headspace for krausen and not difficult to shake . . . if you needed more it would require a second step. Right below this step is the amount of DME required to add to the 1.5 liters (5.4 ounces).

The yeast will probably take all of 24 hours, maybe a little longer, and they will tell you when they are finished. You may have a two hour lag time or 8 hours of lag . . . that's a little game the yeasties like to play with brewers. As the yeast grow you will observe considerable foaming (off-gassing) every time you shake, this is good. This is CO2 resulting from yeast cellular respiration. You should also have a very distinct and pleasant aroma. You may have a decent krausen but randomly the little buggers will hide that from you (yeast pranks again). As the yeast reach their final growth you will notice the off-gassing is reduced to where there is finally no foaming when you shake. The yeast are no longer exhaling (growing), they are done. If you use oxygen and yeast nutrient it will speed things up. The more you shake the more you make.

When done I normally give it another couple of hours to be sure, then chill for 24 hours. Before pitching I pour off the liquid (uninteresting beer) and pour straight into the fermenter. Some brewers insist on pouring it all in the fermenter . . . but I don't do it that way.

 

Since you don't have a stir plate yet, you don't necessarily need to use a flask. I use an empty 1-gallon water jug for my starters (shaken, no stirred) and it works great. I suggest you put it on a plate in case you get a bit of overflow, my counter top got pretty messy the first times I made starters. Use the simple recipe of 100g DME per litre of starter wort and you should have something just right for commercially-bought yeast.

 

I make a 1.2 liter starter in a 2 liter flask and usually dont have a problem with excess krausen. The only time I did have a problem was with the 3068 wheat beer yeast.

Last weekend I used the fermcap with my starter and had no krausen at all. It was with the 3711 too.

 

Sometimes it does. I have had starters barely bigger than 1L blow off in a 2L flask. Other times, there's practically nothing, especially with a stirplate constantly re-mixing everything. I'm sure there are a lot of factors.