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Starter sourness/ripeness question

venkitac's picture
venkitac

Starter sourness/ripeness question

I've been going thru a lot of extremely informative old posts on sourdough starters today, and TFL is awesome! One thing is still not clear to me, though: I have read in a couple of books that "if your starter tastes sour, it is past its prime to leaven bread. Refresh the starter, wait till it is just before the point of collapse, and then it is at its prime". I believe I understand the "just before the point of collapse" part, that's the same deal as for a commercial-yeasted poolish. What I don't get is the former part: I have a starter at about 70% hydration. When I refresh this starter say every 8 hours, at 8 hours it doesn't quite look like "just before the point of collapse", it is still happily rising, but it is already plenty sour. So I'm confused: I have a starter that is, according to the book, past its prime to leaven bread, but hey it still isn't at the point of collapse anyway.  (I first thought it must be the low hydration. Then I made a batch of starter at 100% hydration. That too, even after just 4-6 hours after a feed, has developed sourness but it's nowhere near collapse). What should I make out of this?

Thanks!.

bassopotamus's picture
bassopotamus

I'm hesitant to say too much given my own starter experiences the last couple weeks but...

 

I think those instructions seem a little overly fussy. My starter is about the same hydration as yours, and I can't say that I've ever seen it really collapse. It stops rising eventually, but pretty much stays puffed. Mine mostly stays in the fridge, but I've been leaving it out this week and feeding more often to get it more sour, and even at 24 hours between feedings, it has never collapsed (I usually feed more like 12).

venkitac's picture
venkitac

Hi Bassopotamus, isn't it the other way round? If you feed it more often, I believe it becomes less sour. Right?

bassopotamus's picture
bassopotamus

Yes, within reason. What I had been doing is like weekly feeds of a starter that was kept in the fridge and the yeast was going great, but the sour bacteria finally gave out. I switched to storage on the counter and 2x then 1x daily feedings with some organic rye, and it has its mojo back.

flournwater's picture
flournwater

What "sourdough" starter recipe are you using?

venkitac's picture
venkitac

I'm not baking bread at all, just building starter. I followed Debra Winks process with apple cider vinegar, and now I feed to double the weight (always double the weight, regardless of hydration). I'm using bob's red mill bread flour for the feeding. Also, starter was outside all the time, unrefrigerated. Daytime is probably between 70-78 degrees, night is probably 65-70 degrees.

Ambimom's picture
Ambimom

 bassopotamus is right!  Sourdough is not that complicated....or shouldn't be.  Remember that the prospectors during the Gold Rush in California are the ones to whom we owe San Francisco sourdough.  They didn't have fancy equipment, know a thing about hydration, or stress about temperatures.  They carried their starters in pouches around their necks.  It's a gift from nature.  There are thousands of videos and photographs on the web that will explain and show how a live starter is supposed to look.  From my experience, once you know what a healthy one looks like, you've got it mastered.  I have worked out a formula for feeding and maintaining that works for me and keeps my starter happy and healthy.  Yes, it took a bit of experimenting and I'm still perfecting it but it requires minutes of my time....Find what works for you!

venkitac's picture
venkitac

Will do, that's what Dan said too. Thanks!

Thinking more about this, I still have a followup question, this is not a technical question, more like what tricks people use to get their sourdough bread (or dough) ready on time. Many sourdough recipes call for using an ounce of ripe starter to produce a levan build, which is further used to raise the final dough. Right now I'm on vacation, and I'm a mother to the dough and the starter and keep checking on everything every 30-60 mins, but it won't work when I'm back at work.

Suppose I bake only once or twice a week (which is usually true for me), and feed refrigerated starter on sundays. If I want to bake on wednesday, I will start the levain build on tuesday evening (say). By tuesday evening, the starter will be a certain ripeness (likely underripe) and thus the levain build will take longer to be at the proper ripeness. But say I bake on saturday - by friday evening the same starter will likely be fully ready and ripe and thus the levain build will be ready earlier in the morning. How do people make sure that the levain build is always ready at the same time in the morning (say 8AM) and you can do what you need to before going to work? Is the trick to dechill the original starter for a longer period of time before starting the levain build on tuesday evening than friday evening, so that on both wednesday and saturday morning , the levain build is ready at the same time in the morning?

bassopotamus's picture
bassopotamus

I do my SD as a low knead style, and you get a ton of flexibility that way. The mother builds a starter (I think your levain here) which sits out about 8 hours, then goes in the fridge, and is usable for a couple days. Then it gets turned into a dough, which sits out about 4 hours, then goes in the fridge and is also good for a couple days. My wife and I bake for a Saturday AM farmer's market and do 16 boules of SD a week (along with 5 other breads. Here is kind of what our schedule looks like. 

 

1. Keep mother happy as needed.

2. Wednesday- mix levain/starter. Leave out 8 hours, stick in fridge

3. Thursday around dinner time- make dough, leave out 4 hours, stick in fridge

4. Friday AM- shape, proof, bake

Any fridge step can be extended out to fit your schedule.

 

good luck

bassopotamus's picture
bassopotamus

Once it is doubling in 8 hours, I'd give it a try for some bread. What I found with mine is that it had the yeast power within a  week or two of starting, but took longer to get a stronger SD flavor. I'd just give it a try if it has the yeast activity and see what you get.

 

I saw a great response on a thread the other day. SOmeone posed a question like "what happens if I do xxxxxx?" and someone replied "you still get bread." I don't think it was meant to be flip. There is just some trial and error involved, and not every loaf is going to be perfect, but learning is half the fun, maybe more. And with my SD, I've never made a loaf that was inedible, just different varieties of tasty...

plevee's picture
plevee

And how do you manipulate the rebuilding to 'perfect'?  Patsy