Olive Oil in Starter

[Kieran the Human]

I was reading about New Belgiums experiments with adding olive oil to their yeast instead of aeration. I'm thinking about giving it a go for my next big beer, probably just a drop into the starter a few hours before pitching.

Has anyone here tried this?

[irish_goat]

Never heard of the idea myself but I might give it a go next time.

Plenty of info + an entire thesis on it here. http://brewcrazy.com/brewing-beer-with-olive-oil-article/

[Eoin]

I was reading about New Belgiums experiments with adding olive oil to their yeast instead of aeration. I'm thinking about giving it a go for my next big beer, probably just a drop into the starter a few hours before pitching.

Has anyone here tried this?

No, but I have read of it for about 5 years with interest. I think it's been tried on HBT you only need to dip a toothpick in oil, so little is needed.
If you try it, let us know how you get on.

[Kevco5]

St. Fursey does this quite a bit, I done it for the barrel project (imperial stout og 1.090 approx.) and it fermented out with no more additional aeration than one of my pale ales!

Eoin is spot on about the toothpick, you only need about 1/1000th of a drop!

http://www.winning-homebrew.com/olive-oil.html

[Kieran the Human]

I'll definitely be trying it in the near future, might try it on an Belgian Dubbel as it's meant to increase ester production slightly. I'll keep you guys updated. Thanks for the feedback

[Hop Bomb]

My RIS was at 1.100. I used olive oil & splish splash aeration & yeast nutrients in the starter & I still had to shake it every week to wake the beast up. Finished out at the correct gravity 1.022 but it took nearly 4 weeks fermenting at 17c. Yeast was wlp001.

[St. Fursey]

+1 for the olive oil.
If I'm not making a starter I just dip the toothpick into the wort as I'm transferring from my boiler to the fermenter.
Haven't noticed any off-flavors as a result.