Yeast Bomb

[RumJohn]

@ Mashy: You got brave. Great.

My reason for being on here is to learn something and/or pass some of what I have learnt over the years, onto others, so they can perhaps arrive at a happy point faster than if they went it alone.

Nothing is going to replace jumping in boots and all. There is a wealth of information on here, waiting to be utilized. But for some reason, some individuals want to run before they can walk. Their first wash might be an attempt at a famous whisky or a neutral.

Neutrals are very unforgiving. You have no room to the left and right of center. Not if you interested in quality. This is why I suggest people start out with a rum. There is a lot of room for non exacting actions that will still let a beginner arrive at an acceptable conclusion. As they learn what wash produces what when run through the still in whatever manner, they can and will make changes accordingly.

Distilling is not complicated. It is the distillers that make it so. I don't use turbo yeast, carbon, sparkaloid or any other crap that wasn't around 200 years ago.

[Mash]

Distilling is not complicated. It is the distillers that make it so. I don't use turbo yeast, carbon, sparkaloid or any other crap that wasn't around 200 years ago.

You have done it before RJ and you have done it again.
What a succinct and brilliant comment.

I think we might even title it the " 200 year rule"

LOVE IT !!

PS you may have noticed I am not a fan of Turbo's either

[ant]

Well, to me, none of this is complicated. It has all been very easy to do. I may not have gotten the results I would have liked yet but that is the nature of science and experiment. As for time it has been less than four days and not much actual time in a day. Effortless really.

I started with whey because I asked if it would work as a nutrient and was encouraged, mashy included, to try it and find out. I did, not because I am in any hurry to make booze, but to answer the question for everyone. It's the only reason I made a wash at all. I could easily rescue this just by bringing it to the boil and then adding yeast after it cooled. But we wouldn't learn as much that way.

I don't drink rum so why should I make it just because it's easy to do? My purpose in this experiment is to learn something about whey as a nutrient, not to make any alcohol I can as quickly and easily as possible. Perhaps you didn't read back before commenting? Realise this was an experiment with a specific purpose? Did you note that Packapoo informed us NZ whey is fermented into alcohol in huge quantities in PNG? Not entirely new.

Also I have little tolerance for the "if it wasn't done 200 years ago it's not worth doing" crap. It's a simple science, it was done pretty well 200 years ago, a reflux column is still a useful tool. So is stainless steel, electricity and a host of other innovations. Just because turbo yeast tastes shit without filtering doesn't mean everything new is crap and even that is horses for courses.

Helpful insight into what may be, or not be, happening would be appreciated. If you don't have a clue then why don't you just keep quite while I try and find out? We're not rednecks and this is not HD. So be helpful or be quite.

The PH keeps dropping so something is going on. I used a bit of bicarb again and brought it back up. It is bubbling gently, just not as much as I was expecting. More like my memories of my dad's wine demijohns than the descriptions of foamy crusts I have read here. Wondering if something bad had happened to the yeast while it was in the whey before adding it to the sugar water I decided to add some more.

I reasoned that it was either starting slow because some small population of surviving yeast was doing it's best or whey doesn't have the right nutrients or the yogurt bacteria are poking their oar in or something I haven't thought of. A process of elimination seemed like an idea. So add more yeast first.

I drew 400mll from the bottom and stirred a teaspoon of yeast into it. I then made the mistake of just dumping it all quickly in at the top. Instant mintos effect and I lost about 700ml to the floor when it foamed up; despite quickly draining 500ml from the bottom to lower the level. Added some more yeast in case I had just lost the intended addition.

Put the lid back on and will check again later.

[Mash]

I sense I have vexed you and that was never the intention.

The reference to "200 year rule" I was referring to turbos and the like. Never so literal.

I am sure you understand this is a complex subject (as complex as we what it to be) and it is difficult to separate facts from commercial fiction.

We all help each other with that and we all will do it differently.

[ant]

Yeah when I see echos of HD attitudes here it does irk me. Not to mention feeling personally attacked because, apparently, what seems simple to me is too complicated for the tastes of some.

Lack of intent accepted.

Wash now has a light foam on top. Still not a crust but very different from before.

So, yeast. Neither the temp or the PH should have damaged the yeast. That leaves the yogurt bacteria as the prime suspect. Conditions were perfect for them. It seems possible they may have attacked the yeast. Possibly even eaten them. This suggests I should have boiled the whey before using it as a nutrient. I can test that theory next batch of whey.

It may be that now the wash is cooler the bacteria are at a disadvantage to the freshly added yeast. They thrive at different temps Nutrients may or may not be sufficient. Time will tell. No idea if the original yeast is now part of the nutrient supply or in what form if so. YogBac vs yeast=? Dunno.

I'll test temp and PH again tomoz. See if the SG has changed at all. See if the foam has developed any.

However this turns out I'll prolly have to run another whey wash after I find out what happens when the whey is boiled first. Eliminate the yogbac from the variables.

[ant]

Well, temp is down to 18degC, ph keeps dropping below four but the yeast continues to work and SG is now dropping.

Looks as though this wash is working. The lesson to take forward to the next whey wash is kill the yogbacs first.

A second wash will be needed to evaluate the nutrient potential of whey without the confounding factor of yogbacs apparantly kicking baking yeasts arse and altering the nutrient content and possibly PH, whilst competing for survival and growth.

I will let this one run to see where it ends and if there is anymore to be learned.

[ant]

Well this wash is making slow progress. Temp has stabilised at 16°C. PH is not dropping as fast. SG has dropped from 7 to 2.1. Will wait patiently for it to finish before trying again with boiled whey. If that one works but the PH also drops as fast as this one was doing then I'll try a third one with the addition of a buffer. After that I'll have an opinion on whey as a nutrient. So far so slow.

[Smiler]

Hi Ant, did you find that boiling worked with the whey wash? If I remember correctly don't the bacteria in yoghurts and resulting whey make lactic acid amongst other things? Gives yoghurt it's tang an how it kinda makes yoghurt from milk lol. Now I know they utilize lactose but maybe they can break down fructose/sucrose too ?!? I would have to look into it more but plausibly maybe putting the bacteria in the whey into a sugared wash kick started them off and competed with the yeasties. I'm guessing this theoretically could be why you see your pH drop as they're producing lactic acid pdq. Occams razor an all that. Reckon pasturizing at 70deg C first will probably solve the issue if this is the case. Keen to read if it worked

[Smiler]

Hi Ant been having a bit of a read around as your problem intruiged me! Depending on the strain of lactic acid producing bacteria in your whey they can and will utilize sugars such as glucose/sucrose/fructose and others and therefore produce the undesirable lactic acid, also competing with the yeasties as they multiply rapidly. Secondly a double whammy, lactic acid inhibits yeast growth pretty damn well so basically your wash with unpasteurized whey was likely to struggle if the bacteria cracked on with their job (unintentionally). Not included links as most of this was siphoned out of published papers and the like on the interweb however should you wish to read more just Google 'does lactic acid inhibit yeast growth' and 'can lactic acid bacterias utilize glucose (or simple sugars)'. You'll find what you need and more probably.... Hope that helps

[ant]

Yeah I'm sure you're right and the yogbacs have been giving the yeast a hard time. They normally eat fat and excrete protein. News to me they can eat sugars.Thanks for the info and taking the trouble to find it.

As this one is soooo slooow I haven't tried the pasteurised example yet. Waiting more or less patiently for this go finish.

I will report when this one finally ends and let you know how the next one goes. I will probably just boil it briefly; reports of Bvit heat destruction are overcautious.

[Smiler]

You'll be ok with a quick flash boil/pasteurization - 10 mins at 70deg would do the job nicely. I was surprised they could utilize other sugars too but in a way it kinda makes sense. Heat denaturisation of vitamins is a strange subject (and a volatile one, causes no end of arguments with my missus lol). Look at it this way, broadly generalizing most are stable(ish) with a little boiling. Some really aren't but mostly even if they are effected by the heat a little remains present albeit in v low quantities! Vitamins in fruit and veg start dropping the moment you pick them anyways. Like I think mentioned way above Marmite/yeast extracts are loaded in B vits - some are still present after reduction of the scum but bear in mind as an example yeast extracts are heavily fortified leading them to be banned in some countries like Denmark. Not entirely sure what they put back in vit. wise but it's quite a few of them