Is my levain well prepared?
I'm still a bit in the dark with sourdough baking, but I did learn quite a lot in the last few weeks from advice and tips that I received here and a little bit by practicing.
Today I used 20g of 100% rye starter with 55g bread flour (12% protein) and 55ml water in order to prepare a levain. Twelve hours later the starter had risen by about 70-80%, but there were no significant bubbles in it. The consistency of the starter was sticky and stretchy like soft bubble gum. It was really elastic, almost like a membrane.
I discarded about 30g of it and added 40g bread flour and 40 ml water. I'm going to keep it overnight, another 11-12 hours.
My question is, assuming that the consistency of the starter will remain as I described above (sticky and stretchy, not many bubbles visible in it), would it be worth trying to use in a bake or am I going the wrong way about it? The reason that I'm asking is that everyone talks about lots of bubbles and a big rise of the starter being present when it's ready for use. Mine is not exactly like this.