my starter (affectionately named "dr. hip hop", which has definitely stuck) is definitely getting stronger with the twice daily feedings (have kept to co-op flour and will be moving back to bread flour today since i've run out until the weekend), although isn't really back to one hundred percent and still takes closer to 3.5 hours to double.  i have not been throwing away the extra that you scoop out of the dish -- i've been reserving and then cooking new loaves with it and running up a list of baked goods that also include starter.  it's not super strong, but i've been augmenting with some instant yeast and got great results.  i was a litlte irritated to have to do that at first, but the bread came out so great i was really excited to have made something good again.  i was just working with white flour, none of the healthy junk like i usually do, and everyone agreed that was the best :)  even me, miss weight watchers weird ingredients ancient grains only scarfed down a few white scraps when the opportunity presented itself.

questing right now to find the best white loaves.  if you google amish white bread there's a great recipe that comes up on allrecipe; that's where i subbed in the starter+yeast and it rose faster than anything i'd ever worked with before.  also used a tangzhong because i love the way the cooked gluten gets the bread so cottony.  but the perfecentages weren't quite right...trying again with another set of loaves with the same recipe but carefully noting my changes.  i reduced the oil (and subbed out half for coconut oil), upped the salt, made a smaller tangzhong so the recipe wouldn't be as wet and also mixed in 2 TB of chia seed gel (gives it a nice speckled look, plus the chia seed gel should hold in the moisture of the loaves similar to the tangzhong and give it a nice earthier flavor).  possibly it may taste to healthy.  if the dough still smells "healthy" when i go to bake it i'll coat it in melted butter, hopefully no one will notice.

i'm trying to really walk the line between good gluten development and dough that's too sticky.  too sticky/wet dough can have enough gluten development, but it's moot if you can't work with it.  the white loaves earlier couldn't really be handled, but with the reduced oil and my careful measuring and noting of the water, lessening of the tangzhong and fully incorporating the oil this time around the development was really really nice.  sticky but stretched with the consistency of a weak rubber band.

i baked up another set of loaves with a whole wheat, spelt and rye mixture.  haven't tasted it all yet -- had a really nice crusting (but not ideal, i wonder if it's possible to get such a typical artisan crust with whole wheat flour?  maybe that's another thing special to white).  this was 100% starter, and i left it out for a little less than 24 hours to proof (i haven't been able to revive a starter loaf that's gone into the fridge, and when i leave it out that long the sourdough gets SO SOUR.  it tastes like there's vinegar in the bread, but even better is that when you add a little bit of butter it tastes like cheesebread.  also my 12 hours plus work day prevents me from having too much control on rise times). 

i was happier with the crusting than the first time i almost burned the house down trying to work out the steam situation (and shocked i didn't burn myself), but the loaves were definitely too wet.  looking forward into cutting into one of them last night.  i did a tangzhong with a third of the spelt flour to see what would happen.  spelt has low gluten development so i thought super-hydrating it might be an interesting experiment.  i'm really fascinated by that particular method, especially since there's so little information available on it in english on the web.  i think it will end up with a wetter loaf/denser crumb, which with the vinegar taste is fine by me.

Over Christmas I had a gay old time back home in WY collecting freshly fallen snow and leaving various casques of wet grains sitting around on the countertops to see if any "beasties" (as people seem to call them on TFL) would come to visit. I ended up having some success with some spelt-noodles which I left out with water and a bit of vinegar, and too with some organic irish oats that I left out, again with water and a T or so of standard $1-per-huge-container vinegar mixed in. I set one or two plasticwrapped bowls of flour-mixes (used organic AP once, I think, and then just switched to whole-wheat) on the heat-ducts at night to help the critters get the ball rolling, and also emplyed the heat from the pellet-stove in a similar manner. (I actually cooked two of my starters because I'd turned the heat up too high at one point. They were apparently both viable because they'd both risen before being somewhat solidified in place and turned into not quite "bread" by the heat. 'Shame really.)

I came back on the plane to Indy (I study here) with four jars, and after some feeding it was clear that TWO of them had made it (largely as a result of the type of lid each jar had been sealed with). After a bit of downtime, I got Rocketstarter (who survived in checked baggage somehow) forming a very nice head of foam using... of all things, OAT flour (it can triple in under a day if it's given the right amount of water and flour in one feeding) and Applestarter was able to follow once I learned it preferred some of the wheat-flour I have here.

I've since divided both and now have whole-wheat and rye versions of both, and have one spelt (a child of Rocket's) who's gradually gaining footing. I decided to try it because I actually took my starters into the winter farmer's market here on two occassions to ask a very knowledgable strictly-organic baker who appears there every week about strategy, feeding schedules, and how my starters were looking and smelling. He's been incredibly helpful in many ways but I won't go into too much detail. (The smell-part is not something I can really ask about online, somuch, and I'm still training my nose in this context, so that was definately one thing.) But, where to go from here? Ideally I'll ofcourse get really good at making sourdough pancakes, but I'm looking to get a favourite starter or three into the fridge so I can get a proper routine going, and get a consistent supply of real bread flowing. (It doesn't have to be sour, necessarily.)

On tap, I've got organic AP flour coming out of my ears, roughly two cups of rye left, roughly two cups of whole-wheat, and plenty of spelt. Also I have a ton of bulgur, and a ton of vital wheat gluten, and milk-powder, honey and turbanado... salt ofcourse... (While I'm at it, I've also got quinoa, millet, and amaranth which I could grind, but I know those can be more of a challenge to bake with, thus I'm leaving those till later.) SO, is there some way I can compare how the starters all behave during baking under similar conditions given what I have around? (more info just ask...) I've got a reasonable knead and stretch-and-fold down now, and now that I'm back home I've got an accurate digital scale, now I just need a reasonable recipe (or set of similar recipes) to use to compare what I have. (I may have just found a decent baking stone on craigslist. I've used one twice and both times it was like I'd died and gone to heaven, but I digress.) Any suggestions?

Ten Teachers, Ten loaves, Ten days.

I am going to give all of the teachers who have impacted me each a handmade loaf of bread. I need to find recipes for visually appealing, distinct loaves so that I can express my appreciation, and of course so that I have an excuse to try new recipes!

If any one has any suggestions, Id love to try them. I also plan on using some of the recipes on this site and in the BBA. And of course, as my graduation present was a new camera, I'll share all of my experiments.

Happy Baking.

EDIT - Also, what type of kitchen scale would people recommend getting. There is such a wide range that i'm not sure which is the right one.