Beer Forum

Hello, I made a starter on Monday (today is Thursday), then on Wednesday I decanted the spent wort and added fresh wort to raise my yeast count/volume.

When I got up late last night for a bathroom run, I found the flask full of a bubbling mass and the sponge stopper cocked out of the flask and yeasty liquid running down the side and puddling on my dresser.

I put it in the sink, took out the stopper, and covered the top with sanitized aluminum foil. This morning I found that it had run out more liquid and is still full of a bubbling foamy mass.

My main question is is this still viable? Could it have become infected from having the stopper cocked out of the flask? I'm assuming that the emission of pressure from the flask wouldn't have let anything in.

I'm guessing that the wort I added for my second iteration had too much sugar available and caused the problem.

Thanks in advance for any help on this.

I have starters overflow all the time.....you will lose some yeast count since they are now on the floor or whatever it was sitting on, but you shouldn;t have to worry about an infection or anything...if it is that active nothing should get in there....just be careful when cleaning it up ad get a bigger container

did you measure out how much DME to water you put in your starter? or just guess? not something you should guess at..

did you have foam controlinr the flask? i find without it i cant boil the flask without boiling over but ive never had a starter yeast over flow maybe cause of the foam control.

Foam control is the shit! I put a couple drops in before boiling the starter and haven't had any boil over or foam over issues. A 1/4 t per 5 gal in the boil kettle keeps things under control there. Love the stuff!

Yes, Foam Control is essential in my brewery too. Some in the starter, some in the boil, and some in the carboy once fermentation starts. I usually don't catch the start of fermentation until I've already had a blowoff in one of my carboys, but a little cleanup and a few drops and no more problem.