There was a thread on boingboing where someone mentioned sourdough waffles, which sounded cool, but I don’t have sourdough starter, so I made yeast waffles with dry active yeast - not exactly sourdough, but still radically different (and way better, IMO) from the waffles I had been making with baking powder. I was so taken with them that I’ve made them too often, and now the kids think waffles for breakfast is boring (I’m okay with this, because waking up an extra hour early so the batter could rise was kind of hard on the sleep schedule)
Anyway, yesterday I was reminded of the whole sourdough concept, so I currently have a little tub of whole wheat paste that is hopefully going to evolve into a sourdough starter at some point. My house is still well under 20 celsius most of the time, so it might be a little slow, but I’m feeling optimistic. Hopefully feeding half as often as recommended is a good way to compensate for being 3 degrees colder than recommended
Not only will you be just fine, it’ll taste better. Take a bit longer, sure. But you will have less bitter and weird fruity Esther’s than a hotter ferment.
I’m uncomfortably familiar with hot fermentation - I made a double red IPA that is barely drinkable after two years of mellowing. I hadn’t thought of how that phenomenon would play out in bread dough
If you can get your hand on some (‘organic’, uch… I mean without pesticides) rye, it can help also. I Have very good experiences with a rye starter. Also cold over here, like japhroaig said, more time is the better. Just take easy one the feeding.
I use a very old starter I just keep, and indeed a rye one, easy to use and easy to maintain. When mature some negligence don’t matter. I made it long ago and just keep it because it gives a good rise and is not really sour, a bit nutty. That’s although my preference, some people like it sour.
But for knowing what I was doing and/or talking about I did a lot of experimenting with creating starters. Different kind of ‘flours’, different temperatures and different ■■■■■ percentages.
I’m probably boring you, to make it short, my experimenting followed the theories.
Less water or more, less or more sour, same with oxygen. I prefer the 50/50% version easier on measurements/baker percentage.
Same with temperatures, the higher the most change the starting a starter won’t work. To easy on the yeasts and bacteria you don’t want. And the plainer the flour, the higher the risk with higher temps.
Plain flour, difficult starter, difficult to maintain, sour flavor.
Whole weat, easier than above, possible sour, not alway’s.
Rye, easy, easy to maintain, but not that sour unless it’s kept a bit wetter than I prefer.
A mix of whole weat and rye can be best of both worlds.
You underestimate my capacity to be fascinated by technical detail.
I’ve been doing 50/50 (we’re measuring by mass, right? not the largely random measurement that is percentage by volume?)
I’ve been following these instructions, which start out with whole wheat by immediately wean off to unbleached all-purpose. I may switch to a whole wheat / rye mix if that’s easier to maintain.
Great! And you also remember me to think about the fact I’m doing this by default now. A thing to think about.
Sure we are talking about measurements by mass (But forget I said ‘of course’)
(My opinion)
I can only see the usefulness to wean it off to an all-purpose when you really want to bake white bread. Completely white, because that many starter in percentage is not going into the dough. And although the instructions by the link do not seem really strange, measurements by cup? Sorry, there I go again
Maybe I can recommend this one?
Nice guy’s btw and about ‘keep it simple’. But please see for yourself because maybe I only like them because I agree with them.
Never thought of using rye in the starter. It’s great to add to the dough for sandwich loaf bread because it lengthens the time before the loaf goes stale.
It’s spring here in the northern hemisphere.
Our house is warming up.
Foods ferment faster in our kitchen now.
Time for… ginger beer. NB: it’s always time for ginger beer. Great warm-up-the-body drink for all y’all experiencing cold weather.
As long as you can obtain some fresh ginger root (organic, preferably!)…
source:
INGREDIENTS:
3 cups water
3 teaspoons organic sugar
3 teaspoons diced ginger
Additional sugar and ginger for maintenance
Instructions for Making A Ginger Bug:
Combine all ingredients in a quart jar.
Place a tight lid on the jar, give it a shake, and ferment in a warm spot (72-80°F) for 24 hours.
Every day for the next week add 2 teaspoons each of sugar and diced ginger. The liquid will begin to bubble towards the end of the week. If you’re using the classic cap-and-band jar lid, you will be able to feel the top of the lid for pressure. Once there are bubbles forming at the top of the mixture, it’s ready to use for soda making.
To keep the bug alive and continue growing it, feed it daily using the proportions above. Or rest it in the refrigerator and feed it 1 tablespoon each of ginger and sugar once per week. To reactivate the ginger bug for making soda, bring bug to room temperature and begin feeding it again daily (step 3, above).
Instructions for Making Cultured Sodas:
Mix ¼ cup ginger bug starter into 1 quart of sweetened and flavored liquid
Pour into a bottle with a tight seal, such as our Grolsch-style flip-top bottle (a bottle that has a metal bail and a rubber gasket on the top), and ferment for 2-3 days. (These will explode if you leave them alone for too long. ¡Cuidado!)
Try not to rinse off that ginger root too much, there’s wild yeasts on it. There are wild yeasts in the air, floating around, in most places on earth. The writer (above) doesn’t make it clear you must leave the skin on. Skin on! Skin on!
Ok.
I love Sandor Katz’s works (he has several books out, all well-tested and utterly competent) and he wrote this ginger bug “recipe” which appears in Grist. I note a total lack of proportions. If you’re more freeform in the kitchen and don’t love measuring stuff, go for Katz’s recipe. That guy–a hero to me. Healed himself of life-threatening illness with fermented goodies. Big wow.
After all these years it still feels strange to hear people talking about bakers percentages, flour ratios, and fermentation temps. It feels… Even more natural than just speaking :D.
I always use rye in my starters. I’ve made great starters from only white, but they take twice as long. Also, I usually make starters fairly wet (like 50/50), but I keep meaning to experiment with drier, denser starters.
Lastly, I always place fresh cut flowers in a vase over my starter. The rational brain says, “natural yeast and bacteria will fall from the blooms and make it healthier”. But honestly it’s because it looks nice
Finally had some time to dig this one up, it’s a nice starting point, has pictures or diagrams, always a plus:
One more… maybe some of this is more about how to behave properly when eating in Japan?
I learned to eat left to right, in order, when seated at the counter, because the itamae (sushi chef), is a little like a programmer! He (almost invariably a man) intends for you to the pieces he serves you in a particular order, so you can taste things… properly. The fattier, richer things tend to be served later. (Note: cream cheese and mayonnaise don’t even make the cut… I admit I’m a purist.)
Oh how I cringed when I learned all my bad habits (I am addicted to proper wasabi) were eh ah bad. Imagine my chagrin at learning I should refrain from slathering it all over everything. Oh dear. Well, at least I’ve never been one of those folks who rubs the chopsticks together. I was taught early on by my Japanese neighbors this is really a no-no unless I was concerned about spirits still living inside the wood (rubbing them out and off the bamboo or wood is a good way to release them).
This is nice too. One day, I will go to Japan. And eat [vegetarian things]!
I have a lot to learn but mostly I have Beginner’s Mind. I try to remember that learning about another culture can be a lifelong process and, in my case, apologizing a lot and trying to do better.
Yes, it’s a bit more than finding a common language. It tells a lot more, also about how you approach baking bread. Hello soulmate
This is so lovely. I was thinking about making a rye 50/50 starter in France. Just to try if it will be different from the one I always use and maintain.
The flowers will give a nice accent to this experiment. Nice wild bouqet.
Oh… probably… it’s likely proper listkeeping/housekeeping/boardkeeping. It’s a good idea.
I do apologize to the moderators here for straying afar so often. Conversations tend to fork… right?
Most of the maki I have been eating in the past year have been the ones I make myself, and the hardest part for me is to try to get my rice “mix” the right consistency. I am attempting to lower its glycemic index.
I will endeavor to follow the conversations I have something useful to contribute wherever the threads end up.
Chores beckon (eh they are actually screaming, more or less). Back inna bit.
On Saturday, the starter seemed pretty promising, and I didn’t want to just throw out half when I fed it, so I turned the half that would normally be discarded into a poolish; I realize now that this was actually quite a bit too much starter for a poolish. Also, I now realise that I let it sit for way to long - I didn’t know it at the time, but it retrospect is seems pretty clear that my poolish was way overripe.
So, sunday afternoon I made my dough - gave it time to autolyse, added salt, then folded it at half hour intervals. During the folding, it became clear that the dough was really very sticky. I had to get my son to hold the bowl down just so I could lift the dough to fold it over itself without lifting the entire bowl off the table.
I read a lot of directions about how to keep the loaf from getting crusty before it had fully risen, and I liked the idea of putting it in a dutch oven, but all I had available is a large stainless steel pot. I figured it would be close enough. Rather than preheat the pot, I put cornmeal on the bottom to prevent it from sticking. I formed my boule, and set it in the pot for its final rise. You can probably already guess where this is going based on the overripe poolish - during the rise, the loaf rapidly transitioned from boule to almost a puddle. As it approached the edge of the pot, I didn’t like any of my options - I can’t really pull it out of the pot & reform it, because now the bottom is covered in cornmeal, but I don’t want to have the sides of the loaf bond themselves permanently to the side of my pot. In desperation, I poured a little oil all around the edge of the pot, in the hopes that it would prevent the loaf from sticking.
I was . . . moderately successful. The oil did make it relatively easy possible to release the loaf once it had cooled down. The combination of oil and cornmeal gives the overall impression that Pizza Hut has gotten into the sourdough bread business.
I used a new flour that I bought for breadmaking - it describes itself as “sifted bread flour” but it looks a lot more like whole wheat than my regular all purpose unbleached flour does. The end result looks pretty brown bread, both in the original and rhyming slang senses. Flavor is. . . okay, I guess? Kind of strongly grainy / malty. Not particularly sour. The starter may just still be too young to produce significant sour flavors. The smell of the starter has evolved from just yeasty odors to yeast with strong banana notes and a hint of sourness.
I made it long ago and just keep it because it gives a good rise and is not really sour, a bit nutty. That’s although my preference, some people like it sour.
(But forget I said ‘of course’)
