natural sourdough starter questions

Working on my first sourdough starters. I've been using the 'natural' method (no added yeast) and things have progressed rather quickly. I have whole wheat, rye and white sours started and am currently in day 4. My question is about timing of adding the next round of flour/water; seems as if I am supposed to wait until tomorrow to feed these (24 hrs would be 10am tomorrow) and the sour has already risen and started to fall back down. Should I go ahead and feed these after they rise and fall or should I wait until the estimated time is up?

L-R is white, rye and whole wheat...as you can tell the white has already began to collapse a bit

As a short follow-up i have read in a few places where people discard a large portion of the starter every day and add to it. I have not discarded any (following the recipe) and it seems to be growing and collapsing quicker than I thought it should.

My assumption is that the time frame should relate more to appearance and smell than time? Is harm done to the sour by letting it rise and collapse fully so quickly: in other words am I over feeding the sour to begin with and not allowing it to develop as slowly as it should?

That's looking good, Jim. I am quite a few months in, but still newbie myself. There are a few posts that people advocate feeding starter two or three times a day, for a day or two, before making levain to give starter full strength of activity. During maintenance when not baking, perhaps, once a day.

When I first started, I fed it once a day for two weeks. Then I started keeping the starter in the fridge, and take it out a couple of days before baking. Then I tried to feed it more than once a day to get it fully alive again before making levain.

Thanks so much Chanop! Curious if you were just adding flour/water at each feeding or removing a bit before each addition?

The rye has begun to collapse now as well so guessing I'll wait until the wheat begins to do the same and then give them all a nice feeding before bedtime tonight. I'm trying to push it a bit so as to be able to try a loaf this weekend...too soon for good bread but I can't wait to give it a go.

Ah, ok, Jim. The recipe I follow is 1 part old starter, 1 part flour, and 1 part water by weight. That means discarding 66% of old starter before adding new flour. I keep discarded starter in the fridge and make sourdough pancake or other by product every now and then.

Perfect, thanks and can't wait to try the pancakes--sounds like a fun way to dispose of product!

Pancakes rocked! Extremely light and delicious. Not so pretty but that's how it goes.





First sourdough loaf was good, second one (in pic) was slightly underdone. Had a problem making the recipe as my scale batteries died while adding flour. Since I'd never done one of these before I wasn't quite sure of the texture I was looking for so beleive it wound up with a bit too much flour but it was still quite good. I went through an extremely slow proof and the sour flavor was very well developed for a first go. Cooked it a bit early though so rise wasn't exceptional. Made a few other mistakes along the way as well so have quite a bit to learn.

Nice looking bread! I only use white sourdough starter but I feed mine and keep it in the fridge. It's best fed once a week but I've let that run out to three weeks before feeding it again with no issues.

Very cool, Im starting to read up and make bread. Do you have any rec's on what to read? Mainly about that sour starter and bige and polish as well. Does anybody use citric acid to slow down the growth?

Duckfat said:

Nice looking bread! I only use white sourdough starter but I feed mine and keep it in the fridge. It's best fed once a week but I've let that run out to three weeks before feeding it again with no issues.

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Thanks Dave, it is delicious but I left plenty of room for improvement. For the starter, I still have mine refrigerated but am experimenting with drying the active starter to see how quickly it will come back...figure it would be easier for me to keep up with and that way I can have 5-6 different types of starters without the need for constant feeding. I plan on keeping at least one or two up 'live' so I can have the excess for pancakes.

DDPslice said:

Very cool, Im starting to read up and make bread. Do you have any rec's on what to read? Mainly about that sour starter and bige and polish as well. Does anybody use citric acid to slow down the growth?

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Slice, I am such a beginner that can't help too much, but will say that I have found the following websites most useful:

sourdough.com
thefreshloaf.com
breadtopia.com
theperfectloaf.com
weekendbakery.com (bread-baking-glossary)
King Arthur website has some useful information as well.

I've been referencing a home baking book from CIA and Secrets of a Jewish Baker...between the two, I have had more information that I probably need.

As to citric acid, I understand it to be used for 'cheating' on getting the sour flavoring(?)...I slowed the growth by letting it proof at each stage in the refrigerator. My understanding is that the slower the proofs at each stage, the more of the correct acid (acetic) is naturally produced in higher amounts vs lactic acid (which comes about during quicker proofs). My bread is pretty sour (more than I thought/in a good way) considering it is a first run with the starter.

For the starter, I found a recipe that used unsweetened pineapple juice and flour the first 2 days and then switched to water and flour from there...starter took off very easily with all 3 different types of flour. They have stayed very much alive (though not very active) in the refrigerator. Will be testing the current rye sour tomorrow making 9 grain pancakes. Only thing I did differently was to cover the jars with a coffee filter as opposed to a lid...I was counting on letting in a bit of extra yeasts floating around my place (I make kefir as well).:biggrin:

For sourdough its all about regular feeding schedule and temp for the rise and fall of the starter as long as you keep it in the same place at a cooler temp you should get a consistent rise and fall time with it. I'd recommend getting a dutch oven or thick pot with a lid that can go in the oven at 550 F if your interested in country loaves which make a far better product in my opinion. But for your pan loaves use a young sweeter smelling leaven and try doing a short bulk (1-2 hr) and bench rest (15 min) then shape and let rise overnight at a cool temp room temp like 13 C and bake in the morning should get better results in texture and flavour. (good balance of acetic and lactic acid)

(Also I highly recommend one of the tartine bread books)

Jordanp said:

For sourdough its all about regular feeding schedule and temp for the rise and fall of the starter as long as you keep it in the same place at a cooler temp you should get a consistent rise and fall time with it. I'd recommend getting a dutch oven or thick pot with a lid that can go in the oven at 550 F if your interested in country loaves which make a far better product in my opinion. But for your pan loaves use a young sweeter smelling leaven and try doing a short bulk (1-2 hr) and bench rest (15 min) then shape and let rise overnight at a cool temp room temp like 13 C and bake in the morning should get better results in texture and flavour. (good balance of acetic and lactic acid)

(Also I highly recommend one of the tartine bread books)

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Thanks! Would you recommend the first one? Do I understand correctly that one recipe is over 38 pages? I definitely need some work on my technique and guessing that is what his books are like:doublethumbsup:

I also noticed Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast (Ken Forkish/Portland)...any thoughts on this one?

Anyway, just started my second sourdough--an edited version of CountryTartine Bread by the NYTimes...can't wait to see how this does. :hungry:

Also try reading up at tartine-bread.blogspot.com and girlmeetsrye.blogspot.com . She has a pretty good interpretation of tartine bread. For today, I wasn't quite sure what I did right, but got this 50% white 50% whole wheat 70% hydration (without counting levain) just right, crispy, shattery crust, and light fluffy and rather open crumb.

That bread looks great!

I have the Tartine book and it is very good. It will get you making a good sourdough. It's a very specific method and tailored for home use.

I prefer the Ken Forkish book. I guess the Tartine bread is just a pain in my ass to do at home. The Forkish book is good at setting up the time requirements immediately and succinctly at the beginning of recipes which is helpful when you are trying to squeeze bread into your schedule and not the other way around.

If you want to play with making many different kinds of bread, and have a kitchenaid, The Bread Bible by Beranbaum is a good book. She gives ideas for how to mess with the recipes.

Agreed, Chanop's bread looks beautiful...love the deep color on the crust.

Thanks C, as far as the books go it sounds like the Forkish book may be better bet initially.

I keep putting off buying a nice mixer until I can figure out how to do it by hand...and I've fallen in love with learning the French method of kneading.

[video=youtube;9dUZ0O-Wv0Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dUZ0O-Wv0Q[/video]

Chuckles said:

That bread looks great!

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Thank, Chef.

chinacats said:

Agreed, Chanop's bread looks beautiful...love the deep color on the crust.

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Thank, Jim. I also watched those video from Babette a few times. Some of videos from Richard Bertinet who popularises slap and fold or French fold techniques are also worth watching. He made the process looks so easy.

Anyway, for wet sourdough, you will get good results with wet dough and stretch and fold over a course of time as well.

For me, I am a bit lazy, so I use my Magimix to mix and knead the dough initially and do stretch and fold over the course of bulk proving.

Starting round 2 with working scales Trying the Tartine country bread recipe so most definitely in over my head...

A couple of early pics:

First the leaven...



missed pics of autolyse, but here it is after adding salt and a touch more h2o/recipe...



I'll add a few more pics near the end, but had a few issues developing tension in the rounds but guessing that is related to the high hydration?

Doing a boule and a batard...no banneton so using an oval DO to help hold the shape.:O

Have to figure out how to keep my shape...first pic is of the batard. The color was nice, and overall came out well--except for where I dropped the lid on it right before I put it in the oven. Much improved over the first attempt but leaving plenty of room for improvement



The boule seemed to hold it's shape a bit better and got a bit more spring which must've been related to the shape of the DO.



A much better crumb this time around.

Colour and crumb look nice, Jim.

lots of reading to do *two thumbs up, thanks guys!

One last photo of the current starter when I came home this evening...with a non-cleaning buzz

Green rubber band marked the level after fresh feeding...

I like book three just for its concise and straightforwardness with the recipe and many variations but book two is great because it gives all the background info and really gives great foundation. If you haven't tried scoring try using scissors or a bread lame which allows the bread to rise and expand more readily in the oven and going as hot as your oven will go for the dutch oven method helps a lot I find so it really gets it expanding quickly. Also working with wetter dough like 82% to 100% can help with a more open crumb as you have more water to steam and expand your dough in the oven depending on gluten strength and development of the dough.

Thanks Jordan, I was a bit overwhelmed by skimming the Tartine books. I wound up ordering FWSY and the Bread Bible but will go back and try one of the Tartine books next...it's funny as the one Tartine book that I didn't really check out was the third one and it sounds as if that would be a good choice.

As to the bake, my oven is a bit weird--I set it at 500 and it buries the thermometer @ 600+ but oddly enough I can set it @ 480 and it will be very close to that temp so that is where I start the process now. I like using a DO as it was mostly what I used for bread prior to attempting sourdoughs. I got two huge loaves using the Tartine recipe...I cooked the boule in a 3.5 qt oven and the batard in a 7 qt (I planned on using an oval 3.5 qt but it was so large that it barely fit the 7 qt. Guessing I may have overproofed it a bit...and maybe under kneaded it though the recipe only called for folding the dough and had no kneading steps?

As to scoring, yes I need to improve on that part of the game. I use my pocketknife but will start using a razor in the future...last loaves were actually scored but the dough was extremely soft and I didn't get a very nice (or deep) cut unfortunately. Using yeast recipes, I seem to always have a nice taught loaf that is easier to score...

Next attempt tonight is following rye recipe from Tartinebread.blog (this recipe is by the same girl that does girlmeetsrye blog). This is 80% hydration (not counting the levain which I believe is the correct way?) so it's been really strange feeling in the early stages...all good, only rye I ever made was swapping some rye into the Lahey no knead recipe and it was delicious so looking forward to this.

Thanks for the links Chanop, plan on trying a few of her recipes though I'm not so sure the rye was the right one to start with...sourdough is gonna' take a bunch of practice to fine tune. :O BTW, your pics somehow disappeared, love it you could re-post them as it kind of gave me a nice target

I'm going to post a few more pics just so I can keep up with what I've made...

Rye boule:



Massive rye batard:



And a (not so great) shot of the crumb:



Overall, it is quite delicious:hungry:

Looks good so far! Also you are correct in not counting leavian into calculations on hydration also you could push rye to like 85% hydration for good results at about 30% rye flour.

Wow. These loaves are looking great. Made me rethink how active my starter was - has not gotten the rise and amount of bubbling yours have.

chinacats!!

my favorite thread on the internet..

i am "on your six!" i am going to be trying this in a month..when i move into my new kitchen..

Boom, it won't be long before you catch and pass me...1 step forward and 2 back

Tried to do a ~80 whole grain (a mix of 9 random grains) with about the same hydration...would've cooked better if I had used larger DO's...two got squished by the parchment paper I used to load them. The loaf pan did well...taste is excellent but others won't win any points for end shape:rofl2:

Started by following the fwsy recipe and then decided to go fakie...

loaf pan:


boule: (I wound up with a bit too much flour on the outside)


batard:


and finally the pan loaf crumb (I'll wait until tomorrow to cut the others):

OK, patience is a virtue that I don't possess :O

It's looking like good progress for sure!