March 19, 2017 - 2:57pm
Trying to increase my starter
Hi! I'm new here and I have a question. I was given an amazing starter that I've been using for a few weeks. My schedule is
Remove 3/4c
Add 3/4c water
1c flour
I will occasionally stick in the fridge because I forget to feed it. I want to try and increase the size of my starter so I can bake a bunch of loaves and rolls to take to my work. How do I go about increasing it without killing It? It's just gotten perfect and is he so sad to kill it. Thank you so much!
I've been looking at some of the other posts and got confused with ratios and bread talk. I'm really new at this.
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Next time you feed your starter, don't discard any. Just feed it equal amounts of water and flour equivalent to the weight (not the volume) of your starter. In other words, take an empty bowl and tare out your scale. Pour the starter into it. Now divide the weight by two and feed it 1/2 water, 1/2 flour. After it matures for a few hours, that should give you plenty of starter. If that's too much then just feed the discard 1/2 and 1/2 and add it to the mother before you bake again.
FYI, I never throw out my discard when I feed my mother. The "discard" is what I use to bake my bread. I feed the mother and let it mature overnight, then it goes back in the refrigerator until I bake again (typically 10-12 days later). At the same time, I take the discard and mix my bread dough, knead it a bit and store it covered in the refrigerator (overnight). After 8-12 hours I take it from the refrigerator, knead it a bit again, form loaves and let it rise (usually 8 hours) until it's ready to bake.
Been doing this for over 10 years. I hate throwing good flour and water away.
Just feed it more flour and water, wait for it to mature and use.
Or take some off and build levains.