newbie to sourdough

[Kidder]

Well, I finally decided to try my hand at sourdough. I mixed a starter last night, 2 cups King Arthur AP flour with 2 cups whole milk, put in a glass bowl and covered loosely with plastic wrap in my kitchen. I have the Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Baking book which is really nice, put together well. Hopefully in three days it'll be soured nicely. Being my first time I don't expect much.

I plan on baking a loaf or two before I even attempt at using it in a pizza dough. I need to be comfortable at feeding and maintaining the starter. I'm a little intimidated at the whole process, just because it's such a delicate beast from what I've observed. Any tips you guys recommend for a beginner?

I love sourdough bread though and I imagine it produces an extremely flavorful pizza dough as well. I don't want to resort to buying starter either. I'll see what the Dayton/Fairborn air can offer before I buy a starter.

Thanks......

[Pete-zza]

Kidder,

I think you will find that most of the members don't use milk as part of a starter culture. However, I recently read a post on the PMQ Think Tank where a pizza operator in Australia combines milk, sugar and flour to make a sourdough type concoction. You might get some insights on how the process works by reading this post: http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?p=2101#2101. You might also read other posts in the thread to get further information.

Peter

[varasano]

I agree with Pete. I've not heard of the rationale for using milk.

[Kidder]

The ingredient section of the book says use whole milk but the directions say water. But I've seen recipes online that use equal part milk as well. Who should I believe? Should I make another starter tonight, using 2 cups AP flour with 2 cups water and wait a few days until soured?

http://southernfood.about.com/od/yeastbreads/r/blbb548.htm

[Kidder]

Well, I found another person that has noticed the issue with the book as well. Looks like I'll be dumping what I made last night and using equal amount of water and flour. It was awfully hard to mix together it tell ya. It's just water and flour, correct? There's no need to add yeast like the guy in the link below did, right?

http://www.lunchpail.com/fourandtwenty/index.php?p=16

[varasano]

adding yeast is not needed. That's not the strain you are after.  Keep in mind though that what you catch in your kitchen is kind of random. It could be amazing. It could be terrible. I usually recommend going with a known high quality starter, but if you have the patience for trial and error, then by all means see what you catch.  Also, just leave the culture exposed to the air, as you are trying to catch something. There is some yeast in the flour also, but there is in all likelyhood a dominant strain in your house/neighborhood. 

Jeff

[Kidder]

Yeah, that's what I thought. The guy from that link didn't seem like he understood the whole concept of sourdough. I'm hoping I can get a loaf baked by Sunday at the latest. This little mishap just added another day. Oh well.

Thanks for the response. I'll let you know how it turns out. Or at least how the yeast is up here.

[ernestrome]

I just started a new starter a few weeks ago, and it is only stabilising now.

I have cooked with it a couple of times already, but it took longer to rise than normal, so factor that into your plans as a possibility. Sunday might be a little ambitious, imo.

Contrary to what varasano says, i resolutely keep my jar covered (with small airholes) until it is bubling so that other organisms cannot get into it until it is established.

[Kidder]

I just started a new starter a few weeks ago, and it is only stabilising now.

I have cooked with it a couple of times already, but it took longer to rise than normal, so factor that into your plans as a possibility. Sunday might be a little ambitious, imo.

Contrary to what varasano says, i resolutely keep my jar covered (with small airholes) until it is bubling so that other organisms cannot get into it until it is established.

What do you mean by 'stabilizing', meaning it's starting to sour? Should I leave my kitchen window open in hopes to speed up the process or do you think there's enough yeast in the house? My kitchen is around 70F so I don't want it to get any lower than that.

[ernestrome]

By stabilising i mean becoming ready to bake with, or becoming reliable to bake with. My starter showed signs of life quite quickly, but the first few breads i made took a long time to rise.

Well i ahve been arguing with these guys about whether the bread is in the flour or in the air. Let's not get into that now though.

Put it somewhere warm, like on top of your fridge near the back where the warm air rises.

[Kidder]

Some people say not to use tap water because chlorine in the water kills yeast. I know this is NOT true when using any brewer's yeast. Perhaps airborne yeast is more fragile, I don't know. I'm a homebrewer and have used city tap water before with no problems at all. But I can't smell the chlorine in our water like some other cities. I also use tap water all the time when making my pizza doughs, no problems with my yeast dying. I know beer yeast and ADY/IDY varieties have 'evolved' over the years and can withstand a good amount of abuse, airborne yeast is probably more susceptible to damage.

[varasano]

You are right. These guys are hard to kill. In fact all the recipes that talk about warm water, and sugar to feed them and salt will kill them, etc, are pretty much all wrong. I have never, ever proofed yeast and had it fail. Even if it didn't bubble up right away, there'd be some lively ones in there and all that would happen is that it would rise slower, which is better anyway.

Jeff

[ojuice]

It's pretty easy to get chlorine out of tap water.  Either use a water filter, leave it in a cup on the counter for a day or boil it--and it'll be ok to use.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/ has a decent sourdough how-to.  I had great luck getting a starter going using their rye flour/pineapple juice method.  The rationale behind the pineapple juice is that the elevated acid will kill the bacteria that we don't want, and wake up the yeast (wild yeast requires a fairly acidic environment).  This is also the method used in The Bread Bakers Apprentice, a book by Peter Reinhart, who we all know from American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza.

[Kidder]

Thanks so far guys. I appreciate it.

I'm assuming it's normal for the water and flour to separate a day after mixing the starter? There was a little less than a 1/4 inch of fluid above the mixture in the mason jar this morning. I know you're supposed to stir it with a wooden or plastic utensil once a day until it 'takes off'. The flour is pretty heavy so I assume this is normal.

Has anyone tried the cultures from www.sourdo.com? They have some nice strains of yeast from all over the world and seem to be really passionate about sourdoughs.

[varasano]

yes I always recommend sourdo.com. If you click the globe under my name you will see my recipe where I talk about sourdo.com and techniques for managing pizza dough with natural starters.

[scott r]

couldn't live without the Italian starters available at sourdough.com that one of our members Marco collected.  They changed my pizza from good to great.

[Kidder]

I just stirred it (hour ago) after the first 24 hours and it's separating already. Thin amount of liquid on top. I thought this was supposed to happen a few days after creating the starter. Anyway, there are lots of tiny bubbles on top of the liquid so I guess that's a good sign for now.

Anything I should be worried about? Do I just stir it once every 24 hours up until I use it in a bread? Or do I decant/pour out the liquid that has separated every 24 hours? The W-S book is a little vague at expalining the separation and what to do with it, if anything........I'll shut up for a while now......too much worrying I guess.....

[ojuice]

Kider,

It probably isn't yeast yet, but various other bacteria which multiply before the yeast and lactobacilii really get going.  It'll probably start to smell really rank, almost vomit inducing, settle down for a few days, then get yeasty. 

In regards to the liquid on top, I just stir any hooch that accumulates back in.

Here's some links to read:
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/lessons/sourdough
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.food.sourdough
http://www.schoolofbaking.com/sourdough_tips.htm
http://www.nyx.net/~dgreenw/sourdoughqa.html

[Kidder]

Last night before I went to bed I had this feeling that something was going to happen overnight. The layer of liquid 'shifted' towards the middle of the jar. So I put the jar in a Tupperware bowl in case something violent happens overnight (I'd hate to clean that crap off the top of my fridge). I don't know why I put it in such a small jar.

This morning the starter filled about half the bowl, overflowing the jar! And yes it stunk bad. Definitely a vomit-inducing stench. I cannot begin to explain how bad that stuff smells. I dumped the contents of the jar into a much larger pyrex measuring glass, stirred, and covered loosely with plastic wrap.

I wasn't expecting it to take off so violently. You think this is a good sign? How soon do you think I could try it in a bread, until it subsides and settles down?

[scott r]

that's a VERY good sign.  You have yeast in there.  I would start baking as soon as it starts to smell really good.