How I treat my Mother

[TXCraig1]

The other big factor is the culture itself. I've had some that there was nothing I could do to get a sour taste and others that made a sour sourdough no matter what I did.

[juniorballoon]

Today I'm getting ready to bake another loaf Tuesday. So at 3pm I mix the levain, 25g starter, 50 g flour and 70g water. I have these heat mats that are designed to start seeds or encourage root growth on cuttings and I'm using that as a heat source to keep the levain at around 80 degrees. Due to the way the Mother has been slowing down I expected it to take 18 hours or more to double. figuring that tomorrow at 8amish I could start to build my dough. But this levain almost doubled by 6:30pm. I put it in the fridge to slow it down. We'll see what happens. Maybe it will be ready when I wake up. Maybe it will need some more time at 80 degrees. Maybe it will be ruined and I'll start over. Very surprised at the activity level of the starter.

[juniorballoon]

This was an interesting loaf. Next morning I took the levain out of the fridge and set it up on the heat mat. It took 6 more hours to double. it was a very frothy, bubbly levain. Kind of looked like it had broken. It smelled good, so I used it. The loaf got a bit over proofed. By the time I shaped it it had some pretty large gas bubbles. Using these heat mats is a bit of a work in progress to regulate the temp. And I know I am making changes with each of these loaves, but I am aiming for a reproducible process that gives me the results/taste I'm looking for.

Baked the loaf last night and made a sandwich next day. Baked up great, looked great and tasted great.

My next bake I'll be aiming for a leavin doubling at around 85 to 90 degrees and a dough rise at 80 to 85 degrees. I have yet to keep those elements consistent.