Levain and sour-level questions
Hi all,
long time lurker on these forums, but a first time poster. I’ve been baking sourdough for 4-5 months now, with varying success. I’ve been looking at lots of recipes on this site, and had two question (which are maybe related). There is so much great knowledge shared on this site, so I thought I would reach out.
1. I see many recipes call for multi-stage levain builds (where the levain has various flours and water added to it at different intervals before going into the final dough). What is the purpose of this?
2. Maybe this isn’t specifically a levain question, but one thing I’m having trouble with is consistently getting sourness in my breads. I’ve used a variety of whole and fresh milled grains, including a fair amount of fresh rye, but my breads usually don’t taste very sour. My latest loaf was around 60% whole grain, with 20-30% of that being fresh rye, and I used a stiff levain, so I was sure I would get some sourness. Still barely there. Are there any high level tips people would be willing to share on how to increase the sourness in my loafs?
Thanks in advance for the help and sharing your knowledge!