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Alkaline water & starter

Nikken007's picture
Nikken007

Alkaline water & starter

I'm making a gluten free sorghum starter and it's not doing too well. I read that yeast doesn't thrive in alkaline water, which I have and have been using (home filtering system that makes alkaline water). I don't want to my chloramine treated tap water. I know that bottled water is often just bottled tap water. Do I have to go out and buy bottled water or is there something I can add to my filtered water to make it more acidic, such as citric acid or vinegar? It's not like the starter is not doing anything. A few times it rose nicely and it does bubble, but rising is not often. I put it in my warm bedroom last night to make sure it wasn't the temperature, but it didn't do much. Thanks.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

What is the pH of the water?  

What are the temperatures?

What method and how long have you been working with growing the starter?

More details are needed to help you.  :)

 

Nikken007's picture
Nikken007

It's been going for 7 days. The pH is about 9.5. Room temperature varies from about 68 to 80, usually around 70. At the start it was probably around 68 degrees, possibly less. As summer comes it will be much warmer. I'm new at this. I've been following the method from theartofglutenfreebaking.com. I had 2 small red cabbage leaves in the starter for a few days until my hootch turned pink, which I wasn't sure if had gone bad or if the pink was from the red cabbage. The pink color has since gone.

Her directions were confusing to me and I didn't make the starter right. She had a cup of sorghum flour at 140g which was much more than the weight I got. I didn't know whether to go by weight or cup so I started by weight. I thought the 240 ml water (1 cup) was grams so I put in 240g water. Realizing my error the next day I tried to fix it and was totally confused. After that I went by cup. This morning I took out about 2 cups, leaving 2 cups and added a cup of flour and a cup of tap water, which I hated doing and kind of regret. I'm wondering if it would be okay to use my filtered water and add some pineapple juice. The consistency has probably been too thin, like soup, but during the day it thickens up nice and creamy (and bubbly after I stir it). Is it okay to add flour without the water to correct the thinness? I'm not sure how the consistency is supposed to be, seeing I didn't start off right. Maybe I should start over. I have been making lots of pancakes!

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

I haven't made a sorghum starter but have made gluten free ones.  They don't rise much but make gas bubbles that rise and escape the culture.  That said, with temps under 72°F, it will take about two weeks so you're half way there.  Yes, you can skip the water/juice for a feeding and just give flour to thicken it up.  Or reduce the juice and increase the flour for several feedings to correct thinness.  Flour is the food.  Do reduce the size (discard) to keep the amount of growing starter under one cup.  A cup of flour weighs half that of water.  You might prefer to work with forth cups until the starter is actively churning out  CO2 gasses.  

Hard to see these gasses in a non gluten flour but you can trap them in a collapsed plastic bag tied over the starter.  Other signs of yeast activity include the aroma of something "brewing" 

Very high pH. You might have keep feeding the starter some kind of acid diluted in water with every feeding.  Might be a good time to have some test strips and play around with the water.  See if you can bring it down to 7 using  a cup of water and a teaspoon of 5% table vinegar.  Test it after a good stir.  Add another tsp. if you need to.  Bacteria will first grow in the culture and reduce the pH.  Flour itself has a pH in the 7 range.

There are many ways to make a starter so don't trouble yourself about being 100% right following one recipe.  I let the starters show me what they need.  They can't follow a schedule in the beginning and are often over fed so patience and warmth are key.  See if you can get your temps up to 75°F - 78°F  after feeding the starter fresh flour.  and when temps are cooler, don't feed it.  

Hooch, please explain.  Does it have any darkness or fermented notes or is it more likely separated water from flour? Any aromas?