Dumbfounded and frustrated
Hi, I am at a total loss. I have baked sour dough bread for the last 4 years and have to say I never had a failure. I kinda did a formula from Hammelman with some deviations : added some rye flour to the KA AP and adjusted the hydration. i put the dough in the fridge for 24 hours, took it out, let it wake up, shaped, final and baked. It always worked. Now I decided to omit the rye flour: 4 attempts and 4 failures. The dough looks and feels like dead after the retarding and stays dead when in the bannetons . Does not rise, just sits there for hours ( today 5 hours and it is 80F in my little bakery. I use a third starter and hydration between 60 and 65%.
at the same time I bake. Hammelmans wholewheat with flax and sunflower seeds, Eric's traditional whole grain bread, all with the same starter ( 100% rye, 4.5 years old, use it all the time) and everything works just fine. I feed my starter twice, AM and PM to required amount.
Any ideas?
Make a bonfire and dance around it 13 times while holding your starter and chanting "rise, rise, rise!" Then throw most of the starter into the fire, save a tiny bit, clean out its vessel, and give it an XXL feeding. Whenever I've had a slow/no rise, a good refreshing of the starter corrected the problem.
peak out for maximum volume after feeding. :)
Have you all noticed Jupiter and Mars chasing it across the sky?
thank you both for helping to find the solution for my problem. I actually refresh my starter every week because I only keep about 150gr. I use it and refresh with freshly ground rye flour 100% to have enough for next week. I let it sit about 3 hours at room temp the it goes in the fridge. Do I refresh too much? The not rising only happens with the dough all AP. The doughs with lots of whole grain do just fine.
before chilling. Let it rise about 1/3 then chill. But that would be after you do a big peak out feeding. Doesn't hurt it to let the yeast have a festival once in a while.
Why don't you try maintaining a new starter that is fed with wheat flour instead of rye, and use this one to bake all-wheat breads? Maybe the wee beasties are used to a diet of whole grain (especially fresh rye) and they don't like the AP diet.
intersting thought , lazy loafer. Never thought about that. I always feed twice, AM and then PM I make the required amount. For the regular bread I feed already the first time with wheat flour. Will do some more reading on that.
Thankyou for your input
Barbara
Cooling the dough reduces yeast and lactobacillus activity to a bare minimum. Because the rye flour is richer in sugars than wheat, the yeast are more active in its presence at lower temperatures. As it is, wild yeast starters are far slower than those using commercial yeast. If you insist on retarding a sourdough, I'd probably give it 12-18 hours of proofing time and then bake.
Stan Ginsberg
theryebaker.com
thanks Stan. I had never a pure wheat SD baked before so I handled it the same as my mixed flour doughs. I will try one without retarding in the fridge which is a little bit colder than ideal anyway. I was always concerned about over proofing when I saw the little blisters appear . Those breads are done with the same starter and a 24 hour retard.
thanks again for your input
Barbara
I left my last batch sit in my little bakery (between 75 and 80 F) for bulk ferment......it about doubled in about 8 hours but the dough looked and felt very sorry. Shaped anyway and put in bannetons but gave up after 4 more hours because nothing was happening. The whole grain bread I just baked today ( Hammelmanns flax &Sunflower seeds and Eric's Traditional whole grain sour dough) came out super. They were bulk retarded I the fridge 24 hours. My only guess at this point is that my rye starter refuses to work with that "boring"wheat flour. I will make a 2. Starter converted to wheat and see if it makes a difference. Thanks agin for input .
Barbara
because I only keep one sour culture and it's a 100% hydration rye and it works with everything. Thing about rye sponges, though, is that they degrage fairly rapidly compared to wheat-based sponges. I make it a point never to use a starter culture that's more than 12 hours from its last feeding, and even then only if it's been refrigerated after maturing (if I don't use it right away).
Stan
This is Eric's traditional whole grain sour dough also with the same starter. The lesson learned: pure wheat behaves different than mixed flours.