So I have been cultivating a stiff 50% hydration sourdough starter for months now with the intention to eventually try making panettone with it. I haven't done that yet but what I recently tried was making sourdough version of Japanese milk bread (shokupan) from a recipe I found on youtube.
The first step in that process was to make the sweet stiff starter using sugar/water/flour/starter. After baking and trying the resulting bread, it was mild in flavor and slightly sweet. In fact it had no notes of sourness, or hint of any sourdough aroma. I was impressed and felt like I could have used this sweet starter for making panettone.
This got me thinking about the process used for panettone involving soaking the refreshed lievito madre in a sweet water bath.
Do you guys think this water bath method has the same effect in the end as creating a sweet stiff starter (as in the sourdough shokupan recipes)?
Search for benito's recent posts about exactly this on the TFL site. He tried his hand at making a pannetone and he's been an active practitioner of using a stiff sweet starter.
TomP
First, I frequently bake both panettone and sourdough shokupan. I maintain both a regular lievito madre for panettone and a sweet one for shokupan. I maintain them at around 45% hydration, ambient temp with refrigeration between cycles.
If you’re referring to the bagnetto, that has a small amount of sugar added, I find that it gives a boost in development to the bake day refreshments that are usually done for panettone. However it is not enough sugar to control acidity in the way that sweet starter does.
I personally no longer use the bagnetto, nor do I use water immersion for maintenance feeds. As Ian Lowe points out, bagnetto cannot remove the acidity from inside pieces of starter. However, there may be more acidity at the surface of LM that has been stored. And, the little bit of sugar does have a noticeable affect during refreshment cycles.
On sweet starter, I maintain a separate LM because I found that the same-day approach did not remove all traces of acidity from shokupan. The maintained one does. However, it has different characteristics than the “regular” one I use for panettone. The sweet LM is of course very much slower to acidify, which is great for shokupan but not for panettone, where flavor notes and keeping ability are enhanced by the (controlled) fermentation.
Hope this helps….
—Sue
At the end of your post are you saying that the same day approach for creating a sweet stiff starter would be more suitable for panettone because it helps preserve some acidity?
No, I only use Non-sweet stiff starter (lievito madre) for panettone, because a well_balanced (between yeast and lactic bacteria) starter that has been consistently maintained over a long period gives the best results (for panettone). The gluten strength, crumb, aromatic profile and keeping characteristics are all somewhat affected by the starter. Other factors matter also, and I am not a purist about panettone process. IMO a starter that begins as a liquid starter and then is briefly dried out with more flour and/or sweetened is not going to have the same qualities or results as a (long-term) maintained LM.
There is a lot of sugar in panettone itself, and the amounts can be adjusted between the first and second impastos to help keep fermentation on a trajectory.
Ok. I'm maintaining a 50% hydration starter at room temperature, feeding it approximately every 48 hours (as per the instructions for creating lievito madre). I abandoned liquid starters ever since as I prefer maintaining and working with this drier one. In this case since I'm already starting with a stiff starter that has been going for a long time, should be good to go with the same day conversion to sweet stiff starter.
Sounds good. Your approach is similar to Ian Lowe’s, except he maintains at a somewhat warmer temp and does two feedings/day.
Hi erotavlas, I have been using a stiff sweet levain every time I make a shokupan aka Hokkaido Milk bread. I also make a stiff sweet starter as part of a step in my process for panettone. I actually keep only one starter which is 100% hydration. I find that it is easier to mix and it has been a happy camper so I use it for everything. When I want a Hokkaido milk bread or some other enriched bread that I want to avoid sourness, I will create a stiff sweet levain to leaven that dough. For example I’ll also use it for cinnamon rolls or other sweet rolls. If you are interested at all, I have all the details in my posts on those breads as well as the one step in the panettone in my blog posts.
Benny
Thanks! Yes I found your blog posts for the panettone, they look amazing. I was really not too keen on the traditional process of preparing the starter involving the water bath. Seems like a lot of people have posted about their troubles with it, and it is also time consuming. This procedure using the sweet stiff starter seems more manageable.
Yes I didn’t want to have to develop and maintain another starter. I wanted to see if I could have any success with panettone while using my 100% hydration starter converted to 50% adding a single step making it a stiff sweet starter. Although my panettone is far from perfect, I am getting good results.
Making the stiff sweet levain for a shokupan is a no brainer though, it works perfectly every time without having to convert my starter to a stiff one.
Benny