Cold crash freeze

[FirebladeAdam]

A friend donated a fridge to my noble beery cause after hearing I wanted one for cold crashing in hot weather. Great timing! But it froze a 5 gallon batch of brown beer... I've turned it right down but it still at 2 degrees C. More importantly, I defrosted to 18C the brown beer and, assuming the yeast was dead, added more yeast with the priming sugar when I bottled. Just a pinch of notty grains for each bottle, the yeast I killed was English Ale 1 Escarpment which is really expensive and only on its 3rd batch so I can't harvest it. A costly free fridge!
But have I got the right idea to save the batch? It should be alright shouldn't it? I guess there might be more yeast detritus in the base of the bottles? Anyone had to evade similar disasters?
TIA!

 

[HarryFlatters]

It should be fine. More yeast will have survived freezing than you think.

I froze a batch a few months ago, and while I kegged rather than bottled it, it turned out absolutely fine.

 

[FirebladeAdam]

Did you add the co2 with a bottle or prime it with sugar?

 

[HarryFlatters]

I force carbonated with CO2.

 

[FirebladeAdam]

Ah, then no yeast wouldn't have made any difference! I think I need to get a couple of kegs! It's an easier life isn't it?

 

[HarryFlatters]

The new yeast will be fermenting such a small amount of sugar that any flavour impact will be undetectable.

Kegging is good, but introduces its own challenges. They still need to be cleaned and sanitised, you need a method of dispensing the beer, a method of cooling the kegs, and you need to be able to source gas and all the associated components. The initial costs are quite high, but everything holds its value, so when my doc says I need to give up the booze I can sell it all for roughly what I paid for it

I still bottle beers from time to time.