Second part of this.

I've already mentioned the benefits of liquid yeast. If you tried one in your latest must, or better yet, did a comparison, chances are that I'm be preaching to the choir. However, liquid yeast is expensive compared to that little packet of dried yeast. Sometimes it's hard to justify an 800%+ price increase just for yeast.

No fear, with a few tricks you can drop that price differential down dramatically.

Pitch the Leavings

Do not do this with dry yeast!

Make a wine as per normal, except use liquid yeast. Right after you rack the wine from the primary to the secondary pitch the leavings in the carboy (don't do this if you use plastic as the primary) into the new wine. It's better if you re-pitch just after the kraeusen falls. The yeast will immediately start munching on the new sugars. Voilà, two wines from one yeast.

Starters

Not so long ago Wyeast Labs shipped their liquid yeasts in small packets. Wyeast at the time recommended creating a starter. What Wyeast neglected to mention was that if you could create one starter, you could create two, and if you can create two, you can create four.

A starter is simply a liquid environment that liquid yeast can use to propagate up to a level that is sufficient for introduction into a 19 litre brew. Winemakers have it a little easier to make starters then beer makers, but both are quite simple.

Unlike agar which is a gelatinized medium for propagating bacterial strains, a starter is liquid in nature. The liquid should be as close to the brew as reasonable. The liquid yeast pack is started as per normal and when it's full the yeast is introduced to the starter. The starter is sealed with an airlock and let go. When the starter is at kraeusen (peak of yeast activity/foam) it's pitched into the must or wort.

The yeast multiplies in the starter dramatically before the kraeusen, so you know that a) the yeast is healthy and numerous, and b) it is in a stage of it's growth where it eats sugar ravenously. This is the ideal time to pitch into a fragile must.

Making a starter for wine is simple . . . it's known as grape juice. Go buy some unsweetened grape juice, buy two litres. Get two regular mouth litre (quart) mason jars (if you're doing beer starters, get lids and rings too). Get two #12 bungs from the brew store. Take the jars to the brew store and test the bungs on the jars. If you don't have them, get two air-locks for the bungs. Buy a liquid yeast of your choice depending on your plans.

Start the yeast. Wait a day or so for the pack to expand.

Now, sanitize the jars. I use a tablespoon of bleach in the jars + water. At the same time, sanitize the bungs in the same solution, also immerse a pair of scissors and the business end of the yeast pack in the bleach solution. Leave them for an hour.

I boil a full kettle of water for about 10 minutes near the end of the bleach sanitization. When the bleach is done, I dump (re-use this solution!) the bleach and then rinse the jars by filling them with boiling water. This gets rid of the bleach residue which could inhibit the yeast and also provides a secondary sanitization.

Pour the grape juice into the jars about 3/4 full. Cut the yeast pack with the scissors and pour half of the yeast solution into each jar. Bung and airlock.

Beer starters are a little more difficult. Instead of grape juice, you need a cup of dried malt extract. Boil a couple of litres of water and add the dried malt extract. Boil for ten minutes. Pour the "wort" into the jars. Seal with mason lids and rings and wait for them to seal (you'll hear a pop as the air in the jars compresses pulling down the lids. When they are cool . . . or whenever you are ready (they are canned after all) pitch the yeast. I do several of these at a time (like 8) so that I have beer starters on demand.

If the yeast was active when you pitched it into the starter, it'll be about a day or so (for beer, longer with wine) when one of the jars is ready to be pitched into your wort. Just watch for the kraeusen, when you see it begin to settle, it's time to pitch.

You can let the second jar rest a long while, but I've never gone more then a month. You have to start the yeast up again in exactly the same way before pitching into another brew.

So now, if you pitch the leavings of each beer, you now have made four brews just off of one liquid yeast pack. Now that's economy.

Now, all of this assumes that you've used careful and proper methods of sanitization in all of your procedures. If you don't then you just might end up with a lot more vinegar then normal.

Now there's an idea, malt and wine vinegar for X-mas. Not hard to do either . . . .

Cheers,
lance