The Fresh Loaf

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How tart should sourdough bread be?

nexy_sm's picture
nexy_sm

How tart should sourdough bread be?

Hi all,

this is my first posting here. I bought a book from Ken Forkish Water Flour Salt Yeast about two years ago. Basically everything works great except my sourdough breads have some tartness which other people like to mention, and sometimes to say it's a bit sour. In my opinion it is different than normal commercial bread but nothing untasty or so. I usually follow his levain bread method, where I mix the dough with about 22% of sourdough. The primary fermentation lasts for about 10-12 hours (although he suggests 12-15 hours, but it is already trippled in volume after about 10, 11 hours). So then I shape the loaves and wait for about 4 hours for them to be proofed.

I know this is something which can't be explained in forum but how tart is your sourdough bread. Do you find anything bad in this method and how could I reduce tartness. WHen I don't have time and make faster bread with about 40-50% of levain, it is less tart ...

I use type wheat flout type 400 here in Europe.

 

Best and cheers

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

almost unnoticeable because I don't care for very sour bread. I didn't find Ken's breads very sour either when I was following his recipes to the letter. It could be that your starter is especially strong. 

nexy_sm's picture
nexy_sm

How could I cope with especially strong starter? Increasing flour to sourdough at the begining? Shortening the time for making starter?

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

on how to make the starter more sour. In your case, do the opposite. And yes, using the starter at a younger stage will help with this too. 

starvingviolist's picture
starvingviolist

I have had to lower the hydration to more like 70% and the bulk fermentation time significantly to get Forkish's Sourdough recipes to work. But the results have been delicious.

nexy_sm's picture
nexy_sm

I have the same impression ...

drogon's picture
drogon

Mine mostly have virtually no tart or sour taste at all - which is the way I like them (and my customers keep buying them that way!) The spelt I make is the most sour though.

My levian goes from fridge to build (1:2:2) to ready in about 4-5 hours, then an overnight bulk ferment, scale/shape/prove then into the oven in about 2 hours.

-Gordon

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

have with Forkish or Tartine breads.  Both are designed to be the lest sour white breads possible if using SD.   Rather than base sour produced by LAB; Lactic acid, you might be tasting the sharp tang of Acetic acid that LAB will produce when prompted by lower hydration and cold.  One way to get rid of that is to not retard the dough and keep the hydration up.  Don't retard the levain and starter and use white flour - no whole grains for either and use them when young an hour or so after feeding the last time.  The more iften you feed before using the less sour the levain will be.

Other than that the bread should be mildly sour in the first place.  Most people don't like sour bread so the pros make a bread to suit their customers,

nexy_sm's picture
nexy_sm

I can say that I do not measure the temperature when I feed my levain, but I know when I knead the dough it is rather under 20 degrees. When making starter it might be that I add more of the levain than it should be. I will try your suggestions to see what will come out.

 

Thank for the answer.

Arjon's picture
Arjon

As dabrownman has outlined, there are ways to control the sourness, so it's up to you to decide how much you want and whether the steps required to get the degree you want are "worth it" depending on how much you need to adjust your usual way of baking. 

You might also want to note that it's not an all or nothing situation. By taking the appropriate steps, you can adjust sourness on a batch by batch basis, so loaf by loaf if your batch size is one loaf.

HansB's picture
HansB
Scurvy's picture
Scurvy

I strive for the sour in sourdough. Or at least I try for what I got hooked on back in the 70's with San Francisco sourdough bread. Now I'm going to go butter up me a slice.

nexy_sm's picture
nexy_sm

Thank you all for your suggestions. I think it is clear what I should try next time I am about to bake.