Can I teach an old starter new tricks?
I have a Sunset Magazine starter that I made from yogurt and white flour in 1972 and have been feeding on milk and flour ever since, though not very often lately, since I became vegan about 8 years ago. I do feed it every few months and use it for recipes where I can "veganize" the bulk ingredients and rationalize away the relatively tiny amount of dairy milk in the final slice, pancake or English muffin.
Early in my veganity I asked around about the possibility of converting or training this starter to a flour-and-water diet, how to do it and what to expect. I was told it really couldn't be done.
I've been using Nancy Silverton's La Brea Bread Book starter ever since (which is what led me to stumble onto your site today over a whole nother set of issues...) What THIS post is about is: has anyone on the Forum succeeded in training a milkfed starter to subsist on water (or nondairy milk, etc) and how they did it and how it worked out in use?
Any advice, experiences, caveats appreciated.
Thanks,
Sharron
Hi sharronsuss and welcome.
First, congratulations on keeping a starter alive since 1972.
Coincidentally, that was the very same year I lost my veganity (chuckle, chuckle).
I would suggest that you could (within reason) make the conversion. However, I think there would always be a mathmatical percentage of dairy that would always exist, altho it would become an infintesimal percentage shortly.
I would suggest building from only a portion of your starter, probably from the discard. Keep your current starter fed and happy as normal, just in case.
On the first build I would add 25% water to 75% milk that you would normally feed with flour. You might keep that percentage for the second build as well.
Then go to 50% water, then 75% and by then you should be there. I would be very surprised if it could not be done (yet I have not done it). I have been able to 'train' starters' from one flour to another easily by that method, but I've never tried to another liquid.
I'm sure that some of the more experienced TFL members will chime in, but that is how I would start about it.
Good luck, and let me know of your progress.
dobie
Here is an experiment you can try:
Make a slurry consisting of 100 g flour and 100 g water.
Add 1 tsp of your extant starter (quantity not critical).
Let stand for one day at room temperature.
See what happens.
Perfectly simple idea mixinator.
sharronsuss - forget what I said, try this.
... exactly what I'd suggest. I'd be very surprised if it didn't show bubbles after a day, then feed it again, so you'll have ~400g of live starter, stick it in the fridge and off you go.. Flour & water after that.
-Gordon
I hadn't thought about the Sunset Magazine starter in a couple of years. I don't know what it's supposed to accomplish that a simple mixture of flour and water won't.
mixinator -
I was wondering about that as well. I know (I think) that yogurt and a standard sourdough starter require LABs. I wonder if they are the same or different and does yogurt come with a yeast population?
Maybe you know, I don't.
dobie
and there is no yeast population in yogurt. If there is.... there is something very wrong but possibly wrong in a wonderful way:-)
Thank you dbm
I had no idea nor would I have been surprised one way or the other.
dobie
old tricks - sorry couldn't resist. I used to feed my starter all kinds of liquids just to keep it on its toes. Now that it only gets fed every 16 weeks or so I fee it water. Milk in starters in 1972 was common since people thought that LAB loved lactose as a food - it sure sounded good but wasn't quite scientific. your starter is 1 year older than mine that I started in SF in 1973. I have folded all kinds of starters and other stuff into it over the years. It isn't anything like it was when new.
I agree with Mix and dobie. Gve ti ago and keep your old one around until you see how long it takes to convert it over.
I don't see why retraining your starter shouldn't work. I would just feed a small amount of it with flour and water and see what happens. I have an originally kefir-based starter that I feed only water and flour, and it works like a charm. Unlike my regular starters It smells still pleasantly like milk.
Karin
well rounded starter education back on track!
I'm amazed and delighted at the lively response - thank you all!
Before all the replies had come in, I threw caution to the winds and came up with something a lot like the Mixinator approach, though with larger quantities. Divided a pre-fed 3 1/2 cups of my old Sunset starter into 3 portions, fed one with milk/flour, one with water/flour and one with soymilk/flour. The big surprise was that the water/flour version was off and running within 3 or 4 hours at pretty cool room temp, way ahead of the other two. Foaming, making a respectable alcohol layer .
In the morning, all 3 were bubbling but the water/flour mix was still in the lead. My milk-fed starter (not to make excuses) is accustomed to a warmer incubation temp, so I'm not too surprised, and the soymilk version was definitely the most sluggish, but we'll see...
Then I put everyone in the fridge while I think how to start checking these new guys out by actually making something, which won't happen for a couple of days.
I'll keep you posted, and thanks again!
Sharron
Thanks for the update Sharron.
Glad it's going well. Do let us know how it all works.
dobie
The Sunset Magazine starter was devised by a guy from U.C. Davis. I don't know why he used milk and yogurt. There is nothing in milk or yogurt that is of any use to a sourdough baker. It's the wrong kind of lactobacillus and there is no yeast. Everything needed for a sourdough starter is in the flour. Just add water.
Not surprising. The water in your water/flour starter released more amylase, an enzyme necessary for starter activity. Your milk and soy-milk starters had less water.