Tartine Master Method - wastage question
Has anyone here experimented with Tartine Master Method? (I'm working with book 3, and am brand new to making sourdough.)
I've made the starter, and am ready to make the leaven. The method requires only 1 tbs of started, and 200g flour to make the leaven. Is this how everybody does it?
I'm already surprised at needing 150g of flour to wake up the starter - morning and night for 2 days. And then using only 1 tbs of this with another 200g of flour (separate of the flour needed for the recipe.) Do this seem normal? This is 800g of flour used, before even baking the bread. When the recipe requires only 150g of leaven. That's 725g of flour wasted every time.
While I've been making the starter, I've used the discarded portion to make pancakes. Will I have to do this each week?
Also, I'm a bit perplexed at how anyone can make this bread when it takes a good 24 hours to complete! Tips anyone? How are people going to work and baking bread!? haha
I sooo want this to work, and work regularly.
Thank you for any help you can offer!
that David Snyder has on this website. There are a lot of us who think the creation of large masses of starter is just a weird idea. Once you get a starter established you don't need large amounts and there are a lot of resources here about how to approach this. The good thing about San Joaquin is you only have a couple of hours prep work on day one and then it sits in the fridge for 20 or so hours. Pull it out, shape it, let it sit at room temperature to rise, do final shaping and a little more sitting and bake. You can adopt it to any type of schedule you want. Look up the recipe, it's pretty much fail safe!!!
Thanks, Alan, I'll take a look.
With this Tartine method, I'm also trying to figure out why he doesn't just use his starter in the bread mix, but instead creates a leaven with higher flour ratio. Why? Why not just chuck the starter in the recipe?
I've found this to help with the timing issue: http://sourdough.com/blog/sourdom/beginners-blog-sourdough-timetables
And after reading some other forum posts, I'm thinking I can reduce the amount of starter I keep -- and thus reduce the amount of flour used for feeding. Is this right? Anyone have measurements they like. (I'm a weights person, not a feel-of-it person).
Then since the Tartine Method calls for making a leaven (with the starter) I'm thinking I can even reduce the amount of leaven I make to create only what is called for in the recipe. (Usually 150g is needed for recipe, and but 400g of leaven is made.)
loaf out of Tartine 3. What I am doing for the levain is taking my starter and building it up in two steps. I took 15 g of starter and added 30 g bran/flour mix and 30 g water. I let sit for 4 hours and then added 60 g bran/flour mix and 60 g water. That gives me a bit more than the 150 g I need but I find it hard to scrape every little bit out of the container. I let sit out for a few hours then I put it in the fridge for 24 to 36 hours before warming it up on the counter to use with my dough.
You may wonder about the bran... It is what I sifted out of my whole grain flours that are called for in the recipe. Why the 24-36 hours in the fridge? That is to soften the bran so that it doesn't cut the gluten strands. I got the method from DaBrownMan on here although he generally does a three step levain. I get minimal waste unlike Robertson.
I wish you good luck with Tartine 3. So far, I have made tasty loaves out of that book but nothing that I am proud of in terms of crumb or oven spring. People here are very kind and tell me my loaves look great for the amount of whole grain in them but I want bread like the pictures in the book. So I keep trying different methods with the quantity and types of ingredients Robertson calls for. Be sure to post a picture of your bread when you get it done.
My go to book is Tartine 3. When I am thinking about my next loaf I start feeding the starter. I take a little of my starter that has been starving on the counter and mix it with 40 g flour 40 g water. Morning and night or just in the morning if I forget. That is my leaven which I use to make a single 500g flour loaf splitting the Tartine recipes in half.
I mix and ferment in the evening, refrigerate overnight, shape in the morning bake at lunch.
that will give you boat loads of of the stuff that you have to toss - a real waste and not in my nature at all. These folks that promote these methods aren't bad but they make a heck of a lot of bread that we don't and manage to use up everything that is a waste to us. - Except Forkish who tosses his calling it spent fuel - total nonsense. So just pay then no attention. Make and keep much smaller amounts of starter and levain so that you aren;t tossing anything like the rest of us:-) Waste not want not!
Happy SD baking
You all have been so helpful! Thank you. Just know that I'm not going crazy reading this Tartine book is the nicest thing.
I have heard you all -- I will make less starter!
Prettedda -- Do you give you leaven a few hours to ferment? What time to you make it if you mix and ferment in the evening?
Another question ... do you save some leaven and continue feeding that with the 1:4:4 (or whatever ratio the 1 tbs + 200g flour + 200g water is)?--BUT LESS haha. (more like 1 tsp: 60g water: 60g flour)
OR do you keep the original starter (that I'll take 1tbs from) and continue feeding that, with the 1:2:2?
It is not at all clear from the book! Robertson needs an additional beginning-bread-baking editor!
in the fridge and take small amounts from that to build my levain. When it will get depleted down to the last few grams, I will take it out, feed it to a 66% hydration again, let it rise a bit and back into the fridge. Dabrownman assures me that it can last in the fridge unfed for at least 3 months. So far, it has been a few weeks and it works just fine. I feed it a local high extraction flour.
Is it a feeding ratio? Sorry -- such a newbie! But I'm liking the sound of this idea.
Tartine 3 is a very, very unclear book for a sourdough beginner, that's for sure. Check out Bread Magazine's tutorial here, they have some really nice explanations.
Learning to make bread that takes 24 hours or more is actually a real treat, once you understand how to retard dough either at the bulk ferment stage or the final proof stage, and you can manipulate the timings to fit into your day's schedule. I like the Tartine 3 recipes but don't follow the method as I found it didn't work for me. Just make notes about what you do and the results, so you can learn and get better.