Bottled yeast capture - viable or not?

[jat147]

Howdy,

I know it's not the primary strain, but I thought I'd just have a go at Weinenstephan wheat beer - to see
what the bottled yeast would be like as a test brew on some wheat thats hanging around.

I made a pale malt starter in a demijohn and tipped 2 bottle dregs in to see if it would grow.
To my surprise it has after 48 hrs made a medium sized yeast head (not like you'd expect from a liquid culture)
and I'm wondering how one could tell if it would be worth pitching, and if so on how much wort it could be
expected to work on - I guess somewhat less than the 5 galls you'd normally throw it into?

In general, can bottling strains be of any use, I'm expecting some of the flavour from the fantastic german brew?

Thanks in advance
James

[Wolfy]

How big is your starter?
Let it ferment out and taste it, that's the best way to determine if its 'any good'.

Some bottling strains can be used to ferment, others are not so useful.
Being a wheat beer if they do use a different strain to bottle, I'd guess it has very different properties to the main strain (especially in terms of flocculation), and so may not be what you are looking for.

[jat147]

Cheers Woolfy

It's about 3L I'd say, yeah I'm worried it'll taste nothing like the primary, or be really weak
A taste would answer that I suppose?
Thanks

[Invalid Stout]

With something as distinctive as wheat beer yeast you should be able to tell by sniffing it if it's the right stuff. If the starter doesn't already have those typical wheat beer aromas then it's not right.

Edit: if you don't get the flavour you want from Weihenstephaner try culturing from Schneider instead which is known to be the primary yeast.