Tuesday, April 12, 2016

15 Minute Brew Recipe Conversion

The 15 minute brew processes works on three principles:
1. The same bitterness of hops boiled in open air for 60 minutes can be achieved in a pressure cooker in 11 minutes.
2. Use of extract where appropriate
3. Use of a 4 burner stove in place of the traditional 3 tier system.
For more information see the articles I wrote for home brew talk:
The Briess website has a nice table of all grain to extract conversions at the bottom of this page:
To convert a standard 60 minute recipe to a 15 minute brew, first change the 60 minute additions to 11 minute cooking in a pressure cooker.  Additions between 15 minutes and 60 minutes can be added per the original recipe, if you don’t mind the additional brew time, or they can be scaled to fit the 15 minute time line.
Scaling the hops can most easily be done with a recipe calculator, such as the one found at Brewers Friend.  To accomplish this, start by entering the original recipe, then note the IBU’s from each addition.  The additions from 50-70 minute can be added unchanged to the pressure cooker.  Hop additions less than 15 minutes can remain unchanged.  For the hop additions between 15 and 30 minutes, change the time to 15 minutes and increase the weight to achieve the original IBU contribution.  For the hop additions between 30 and 50 minutes, change the time to 60 minutes and reduce the weight to achieve the correct IBU contribution.
Next the grain bill can often be reduced by understanding what malt extract is composed of.  The table at the top of this post shows the composition of Briess malts.

To convert grain to extract, start by entering the original grain bill into a recipe calculator.  Note the original gravity (OG) and color (typically measured in SRM).
As an example, here is a recipe for a Dark and Malty Citra Ale.  (Thanks Josh!)
Batch Size: 5g
Boil Volume: 3g

6.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract 70.6 %
1.00 lb Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 11.8 %
0.50 lb Carafoam (2.0 SRM) Grain 5.9 %
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 5.9 %
0.50 lb Melanoiden Malt (20.0 SRM) Grain 5.9 %
1.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (60 min) Hops 25.1 IBU
0.75 oz Citra [12.40%] (First Wort Hop) Hops 12.5 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (15 min) Hops 12.4 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (10 min) Hops 9.1 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (5 min) Hops 5.0 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (1 min) Hops 1.1 IBU
3.00 oz Citra [12.40%] (Dry Hop 10 days) Hops -
SafAle English Ale (S-04)
Wyeast 1968

Ferment at 65F for 7-10 days

Using Brewer’s Friend Recipe calculator, this beer has an original gravity of 1.056, a bitterness of 84 IBUs and a color of 9 SRM.  Amber Malt contains Base Malt, Carapils and Crystal, making it a good substitution for those steeping grains in this recipe.  Four pounds of Amber and Two pounds of Extra Light Produces the correct color, indicating that the amount of crystal malt will be correct with this combination of extract.
The resulting converted recipe is as follows:

4.00 lb Amber Dry Extract 53.3 %
2.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract 26.7 %
1.00 lb Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 13.3 %
0.50 lb Melanoiden Malt (20.0 SRM) Grain 6.7 %
1.75 oz Citra [12.40%] (Pressure Cooker, 11 min) Hops 57.6 IBU
SafAle English Ale (S-04)
Wyeast 1968

Ferment at 65F for 7-10 days

To make this an all extract recipe, the Munich and Melanoiden can be replaced with Traditional Dark Dry Malt Extract.  The grain portion of this all extract conversion would be as follows:

3.00 lb Amber Dry Extract 42.9 %
3.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract 42.9 %
1.00 lb Traditional Dark Dry Extract 14.3 %

The dry malt extract can be added directly to the fermenter.  By combining 1 gallon of near boiling water used for the hops and grains with 4 gallons of refrigerated water the fermentation temperature of 65°F can be achieved without chilling.  2 package of S-04 sprinkled directly on top of the wort will provide approximately 200 billion cells which would be adequate for fermentation.  1 packet could be considered “under pitching” but should still make a fine beer.

Monday, May 11, 2015

WYeast 1764 Pacman



The yeast analyzed here has been "harvested" several times and was shipped during hot weather.
Average Viability: (49.02+55.74)/2=52.38%

Deviation in viability = 55.74-49.02=6.72%

Average Settled Slurry Cell Density: 575 million cells per ml

Deviation in Cell Density: 156 million cells per ml


Viability is very low (This may have been due to heat exposure during shipping.)

Cell Density is low.  This is usual considering that there is very little non-yeast content.    The light packing may be characteristic of the strain or may be caused by the harvesting method.

No visible motile bacteria.

No pseudohyphae.  (Lack of pseudohyphae, as is the case here, indicates that the yeast was not grown in a stressful environment.)

Very little non-yeast material.

No noticeable flocculation.  (This is very unusual.  It could be a characteristic of this strain or it may have something to do with harvesting methods used for the slurry.  It also may explain the low cell density.)


Image 38_41

50 live

52 dead

Viability = 50/(50+52)= 49.02%

Image 38_26

34 live

27 dead

Viability = 34/(27+34)= 55.74%

dilution factor is 42ml/0.8ml=52.5

slide 1

816 cells.

1650x2088 pixels, 400px is one side of a 4nl box.

4.125x5.2x4=86.13 nl

816/86.13=9.47 cells per nl

9.47*52.5=497 million cells per ml

slide 2

1149 cells

1744x2120 pixels.


1149/92.432=12.43 cells per nl

653 million cells per ml

(497+653)/2=575 average cell density

653-497=156 deviation in cell density

Monday, February 23, 2015

Yeast Starters: Stirred vs Not

If you have heard anything about stirred yeast starters you've probably heard that stir plates produce more yeast than starters that are not agitated.  This seems to be a misconception that has been unfortunately widely propagated. 

I'm sure Jamil Zainasheff  had the best intentions when creating his Mr. Malty Starter Calculator, however it seems that brewers have taken the results out of context and drawn conclusions from the calculator that I doubt Jamil intend.  The data behind the vastly popular Mr. Malty equation are from growth that had no aeration and no agitation.   (Details of this experiment can be found in the widely acclaimed book: Yeast by Dr. Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff.  [1] If you haven't read this book I highly recommend you get a copy.)  There is an anecdotal reference to increased yield from agitation in the book Yeast, however without more detail on how the yield was compared we can only guess as to what the author observed.  It is also common in scientific papers to use "specific growth rate" (a measure of the speed of propagation) interchangeable with yield.  [2]  Without further explanation I can only assume this is what Dr. Chris White may be refereeing to.

The lack of aeration make Chris White's experiments questionable when used to predict growth on a stir plate.  Oxygen is critical for sterol production in yeast.  Without aeration an the onset of fermentation the yeast membranes will lack the pliability they need to bud new cells.  Given proper aeration at inoculation yeast can double four times, growing to sixteen times the initial population. [3]  Without aeration, as was done by Chris White for the experiments that Jamil used for his calculator, the data show that cell budding was extremely limited. This limitation follows what may be expected given the volume of dissolved oxygen.

Stir plates produce yeast faster, but do not produce more yeast. 

In scientific papers on yeast propagation you will generally see that the time frame used is 48 hours.  [4][5]  Propagation occurs much more rapidly with a stir plate so at the 48 hour mark there is often substantially more yeast produced with some form of agitation.  However, given enough time, without agitation a similar amount of yeast is produced. [6]

Yeast can metabolize sugar much more efficiently in the presence of oxygen aerobically than without anaerobically.   [7]  Using a stir plate oxygen is constantly introduced.  The common conclusion from these two facts is that with a stir plate considerably more sugar will be metabolized aerobically than without.  This is, however, not the case due to the Crab Tree Effect.[8]  When the sugar concentration is typically above 0.5% w/w (0.5°P or 1.002 SG)[9] yeast will metabolize sugar using anaerobic fermentation.  The balance between aerobic respiration and anaerobic fermentation is similar independent of agitation.

[2] J. Novak, G. Basarova, J. A. Teixeira and A. A. Vicente,
Monitoring of Brewing Yeast Propagation Under Aerobic and Anaerobic Conditions Employing Flow Cytometry. J. Inst. Brew. 113(3), 249–255, 2007
[3] Greg Doss, Yeast Propagation A Practical Approach
[5] C. R. Murray, T. Barich and D. Taylor, The Effect of Yeast Storage Conditions on Subsequent Fermentations,
[9] R. H. DE DEKEN, The Crabtree Effect: A Regulatory System in Yeast

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Automated cell counting of yeast using ImageJ


Sample Preparation





Some tips for getting a good image:

  3. Adjust focus on the camera if needed.



  2. Subtract the background with the image
  4. Make a mask by using the Auto Threshold function.
  5. Find the particles and add them to the ROI manager
  6. Make the measurements.



The FIJI build of ImageJ can be downloaded here:


Tuesday, February 3, 2015

Starter Calculator

How time effects cell growth is a factor that I have felt is missing in the existing calculators, which led me to create this starer calculator.   Another personal gripe I have with the commonly used calculators is their unrealistic implied accuracy.  For honesty I have included one sigma error bars on the cell calculations.  I've collected data from dozens of experiments and factored it all down into this Excel calculator.

This calculator also lets you select which strain of yeast you are using.  Right now it is limited to US-05 and S-04, but I plan to expand this as resources allow.

You will need to enable macros to use this calculator.

This is the Beta Release, so give it a try and let me know what you think!

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Cell Density Meter Update

When the Cell Density Meter is released we want to make sure we have worked out all the bugs, smoothed all the wrinkles, and that it works seamlessly.  Our goal is straight forward operation with complex algorithms underneath to provide accurate measurements in the strenuous brewing environment.

At this point we have several working algorithms and are evaluating how they can best be implemented.  The enclosure is in its final stages of fit checks and adjustments.  

To put the Cell Density Meter though it's paces I conducted a comparative study of starter growth with and without a stir plate.  In summary the yield is about the same, but the cell growth is much faster with a stir plate.  Download the full report below.
Agitation Effects on Growth Rate and Yield of Brewer’s Yeast