October 27, 2010 - 9:56pm
Mixing Sourdough starter
Some of the recipies say to mix vigerously. Can you over mix your starter? I have a hand mixer with a wisk attachment. Can this effect my starter if I use it?
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Some of the recipies say to mix vigerously. Can you over mix your starter? I have a hand mixer with a wisk attachment. Can this effect my starter if I use it?
You just have lots of fun playing in it. You got any more gaggets you wanna try? Go ahead! You can end up wasting your time if you're at it too often. How does that song go? ... you're my favorite waste of time... Yes, written about a sourdough starter. No woman would ever find that song a real complement.
Stirring redistributes the food around and prevent the smarter yeasts from conspiring against you. Maybe if you feed them high gluten flour you will end up with gray strands on your beater. Yuck. That's all I can think of. As the starter becomes a member of the kitchen and establishes itself, one doesn't have to stir so often, only when feeding. It's fun to stir and you can notice any changes easier, it also deflates it. I often leave a plastic spoon in my starter.
When I lived in a 1500 square foot town house with a small kitchen the rule was no more gadgets tell you get a bigger kitchen. I now have a 2900 square foot house with a professional grade kitchen (2 fridges and 2 ovens and 6 burner stove with grill). The reason why the question comes up is since I am maintaining 2 starters it take me 30 minutes in the morning. The longest pull is mixing all the ingredients. I tried this hand mixer on my broken starter and finished in 50% of the time with almost no clean up.
PS Gadgets rule my life. I love finding new ones and using the crap out of them. Since I would like to bake for a long time I want to make sure my interest is peaked. Right now it is and finding the fast efficient tool is always a goal.
Thanks for the feedback
Mike