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To all the #sourdough enthusiasts of the fediverse: I'm working on getting a viable starter going. Can anyone recommend a beginner-friendly bread recipe. Given how much trouble I'm having just with the starter, I probably need something relatively easy.
#AskFedi

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Have a look at my posts. The recipes may look tricky but you can use any wholemeal flour but use very strong Canadian flour. The recipes have easy to follow steps and several of my followers have had great results by using them. Any questions, just ask #sourdoughrecipe
in reply to Sourdough2021

@Sourdough2021 How do I know how "strong" my flour is? Being in Canada, this seems like it might be my problem.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Around 15% protein is what you will need. This will produce great sourdough. Use around 80% SWF and 20% scalded wholemeal (see recipe for details on scalding) to begin with. The pic below is from flour I buy in the UKV
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I can offer some pretty beginner friendly advice. Let's start with your tools. What do you have in terms of a mixer and a scale?
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

what sort of problems are you having with the starter? Feel free to ask questions!

Regarding a simple recipe, the one i often use is about as simple as it gets:

200g of starter (should be bubbly and active)
190g of water
9g of salt
350g of bread flour (aka "strong flour") all-purpose flour will work in a pinch.

Mix all the ingredients until you get a shaggy dough, then put in a clean bowl (ideally coated with a little olive oil to prevent sticking) to rise for 2-8 hours (depending on temperature). Once it's doubled, stretch the corners and fold over the center (this is in place of kneading) until the dough stops wanting to stretch easily. Form a loaf in a banneton or a loaf pan or small bowl and let rise until doubled again (1.5-4h, depend on temperature). Bake at 450F in a covered dutch oven for about 30-35min, then remove the cover for another 5-10 until the color is pleasing.

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to Jeff Rizzo

@Jeff Rizzo It's not rising properly. It looks like my flour is the problem. Apparently in Canada our flour doesn't work all that well for sourdough.

I'm going to try a fresh batch with the bread flour I have (I was previously using all purpose because the recipe called for either).

I'm told by @Sourdough2021 that I should look for 15g of protein per 100g. The bread flour I have only has 4g per 30g, which works out to 13 1/3 per 100. Hopefully that's sufficient. If not, I'm off to buy another bag of flour.

It's funny. I started doing this because I wanted to bake bread without having to buy yeast, and all it's cost me is like a dozen bags of flour to figure out how to get it right. 🙃

At this point though, it's the principle of the thing.

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to Sourdough2021

@Sourdough2021 I will take the rye under advisement. Buying a starter feels like cheating. ;)
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I have 5 starters (3 bought ones and 2 I made myself). My rye one and the Tartine one, I made myself. The rye is now 10 years old and works really well. The Tartine is a 50/50 mix of white and wholemeal. The other 3 are bought - San Francisco, Colorado and Alaskan. All of them perform really well. I keep them in the fridge until needed, rotating each. I don’t feel that it is cheating. I have been feeding them for several years so I feel I ‘own’ them now.
in reply to Sourdough2021

@sourdough2021
Love my Alaskan starter! He's like 11 yrs old at this point or something. I keep him in the fridge when I'm not actively using.

Feed 1:1:1 by weight water, unbleached flour, starter

Very not fussy. No special flour or w/e.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

The rye is relatively easy to get going. I keep mine in Pyrex (glass) container with cling film (shrink wrap) over the top. Start with 30g rye, 30g bottled water. Feed twice a day by using another 30g rye, 30g water, 30g of your original starter (throw the rest). Keep going until it gets bubbly and rises and collapses well. Keep in fridge when not using but feed each week.
in reply to Sourdough2021

@Sourdough2021 I'm thinking that perhaps my problem is the way the jar is being covered. It's one of the ones that has a hinged lid and if it's not sealed, doesn't close completely. I might ignore the lid and use cling wrap instead as you mentioned.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I have used sealed jars (Kilner in U.K.) and closed the lids. The pressure shattered the jars. I have found cling film works really well.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

@sourdough2021

My flour is about what yours is - 12.7% protein according to the bag (4g per 30g, probably rounded). It's "King Arthur bread flour" (I'm in the US) - and I've had good success even with an all-purpose flour with less protein, though it's not quite as nice.

What does "not rising properly" mean? Is the crumb especially dense? I've found that my kitchen is cold enough (65F/18C currently) that I have to let it rise a loooooong time - which is one reason why I started experimenting with a proofing box (aka, a big styrofoam container with some warm stuff to keep the temperature up to 75-82F (24-27C) which makes the whole thing take a lot less time. If it's really not rising at all, you could try adding some commercial yeast to your starter - I've done that in the past... usually takes a few batches to settle back down but can help in a pinch.
in reply to Sourdough2021

@sourdough2021
Mine is this, it came free with a shipment of something kept cold. Much less fancy but very very cheap 😀
in reply to Jeff Rizzo

@Jeff Rizzo The starter didn't actually appear to be rising much at all. I'm told it should be doubling in size about four hours after feeding.

FWIW, I'm following this recipe, though I'm ignoring brand names.

I used whole weat flour for the initial starter, and have been feeding it with unbleached all purpose. On the first feeding, it actually spilled out of the jar, but has been fairly inactive on subsequent feedings. I actually marked the outside of the jar with a dry-erase marker to see if it was rising at all. The last one rose perhaps a few milimeters, though I am getting bubbles.

I'm not concerned about my kitchen being too cold. I don't have control over the heat in this apartment, but it's usually pretty warm, probably well within the range you mentioned.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

@Jeff Rizzo Actually, looking closer at the recipe, it wasn't exactly that one, but it was similar. I copied it down and don't have the original link.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

that looks fine. Odd that it was active once, but not subsequently. What i generally see is the starter gets active a few hours after feeding, and then (eventually) collapses down into a runny paste (indicating it's exhausted the available food). I don't feed again until it's in that state.

Only thing i can think of is maybe your kitchen is warm enough that it's super-active and exhausts the flour too quickly. Maybe try feeding it with whole wheat if you have any left...

Scratching my head here. You seem to be doing it right!
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

@jeffrizzo @sourdough2021

I'm in Canada. I use Rogers unbleached flour (I don't use bread flour and it works fine).
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

New #sourdough starter from scratch? - the advice I had was use stoneground flour (as big flour mills use steel rollers, and they heat up & kill the yeast spores in the grain). Add some fruit juice to the flour on the very first mix, to keep it acidic, to avoid bad bacteria taking over (James Morton recommended Pineapple juice). Then you will need to feed&discard daily for a week or so before it's good to bake. doctor, writer, baker, BBC bake-off finalist - https://www.bakingjames.com/links
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

@Jonathan Lamothe I make bread ~5 times a week - wanna come over at some point and we can wear masks and make bread?

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to silverwizard

I've been baking bread for years, the last few in a breadmaking machine.

Would love to get started with sourdough. $ONESON tried growing starter from scratch, but no luck.

And would love to get into some exotic breads, cheese, onion, and especially Groninger Koek.

There's a cob oven in the community garden across from Schneider Haus on Queen St. We should see about having a bakeout in the summer, followed by a loaf swap!

@waterlooregion may be interested in this too...

@silverwizard @me
in reply to Bob Jonkman

@Bob Jonkman @Jonathan Lamothe huh, I have done a sour dough starter twice, and just hucked flour and water in a jar and waited...
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to silverwizard

Is your #sourdough starter starter a sloshy liquid, a gooey paste, or a near solid? And how long before you can use it?

@silverwizard @me
in reply to Bob Jonkman

@Bob Jonkman @Jonathan Lamothe I did equal parts, it made a gooey paste, and I waited a week, with one mid-cycle feeding both times

So 1 cup water and 1 cup flour, wait 3 days, more flour and water, wait 4 more days, had a nice Bread Goo

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to silverwizard

In my experience the flour you use really matters. I spent way too much time trying to get things going with white flour before learning my lesson. It’s stuff like this that makes me miss the pandemic times a bit.
This entry was edited (1 year ago)

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to James Harris

Sadly, store-bought all-purpose flour is all I have on had. I've been adding one tablespoon of gluten flour to one cup of ll-purpose flour for use in the bread machine; that makes a nice substitute for hard bread flour.

But I have the idea it's not the hardness of the flour that matters, but the fact that store-bought flour is mostly sterile.

@jbwharris @silverwizard @me
in reply to Bob Jonkman

@Bob Jonkman @Jonathan Lamothe @James Harris huh, you normally get the yeast from the air

My first starter I used like Robin Hood flour

My last starter I used some locally grown organic weird flour, and they both seemed to work fine?
in reply to silverwizard

@silverwizard @bobjonkman at least how my brother in law explained it, bleached flour will have no active yeast, but rye or whole wheat flour tends to have some. I did have more success once I started using different flours
in reply to Bob Jonkman

@bobjonkman @silverwizard

I haven't made bread in over 20 years, so I can't fill you in on the details of the ingredients. But, I do remember that making my own sourdough starter was dead simple.

Flour, water and whatever, maybe nothing, else the recipe said into a jar, covered with something to keep out bugs and dust (loose lid? cheese cloth?) and put it on top of the fridge for X days. Bingo.

What are you folks trying?
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

My all-time favorite sourdough recipes are from Emillie Raffi in Artisan Sourdough Made Simple

I make the plain loaf and bagels regularly!
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I used the instructions from King Arthur Flour. Starter prep took 7 days. Very easy. I've now had the same starter going for two years, replenishing/feeding only every 2-3 weeks (4 weeks max) since I don't bake alot.
https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/sourdough-starter-recipe
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Started a fresh batch with some of the feedback I got. This is roughly 10 hours after the first feeding. This is similar to the result I got on previous attempts, except that it nearly wouldn't rise at all on subsequent feedings.

The recipe called for the second feeding to be 24 hours after the first, and then every 12 hours thereafter.

I'm going to try at the 12 hour mark though, since I think the problem was that it had starved by the 24h mark. I'm also using bread flour this time instead of all purpose. I started with whole wheat, because it's what I had on hand, and my wife might murder me if I tell her I need to get yet another variety of flour. 🙃

Is this common for a first feeding? My apartment tends to be quite warm, FWIW.

#sourdough
in reply to silverwizard

@silverwizard Yeah, if nothing else, a larger one. This is actually a step up from the one I started with, but I still didn't quite go big enough.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

It depends on how lively your starter is and the ambient temperature. If you’re feeding regularly it should be very quick to double, if it’s been more than a few days you might need a couple of feeds before it’s ready to bake with. My starter lives in the fridge, I take it out the night before I plan to bake and feed it. The day of the bake I take out 100g of starter and put the jar of remains back in the fridge where it stays for 3-4 days until my next bake.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Just gave it its second feeding at the 12 hour mark. Guess we'll see of that helps.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Well, I'm definitely no longer having issues getting my #sourdough starter to rise. I have invested in a larger jar into which I will transfer it on the next feeding.

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

@me comes home after running some errands downtown only to find #Sourdough starter oozing out of all the outwardly burst doors and windows of his home 😆

Bob Jonkman reshared this.

in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

Very young starters (1/2 weeks old) usually have a crazy activity, but it is driven mostly by bacteria that you don't really want to bake with. With more time, the good yeasts will take over, and that's when it becomes mature (~3 weeks in). So don't be surprised if it slows down in the next couple of weeks, that's normal: it is finding its own healthy and long-term microbial community. You might also notice a change from a sharp sour smell (bacteria) to a smoother yogurty one (yeasts).
in reply to Virgile Andreani

I maintain mine in a 500 mL jar (2 cups). During the week, I refresh it every day with a spoonful of the old starter (usually not even a spoonful, just what is left on the sides of the jar), 15 g of flour (about 1/8 cup) and 15 mL of water (about 1/16 cup). The day before a baking day, I use 3 to 4 times that, and this still fits in the 500 mL jar. If I am not baking, I pour the starter into a skillet and I add some raisins: it makes a nice snack and allows to keep my amount of starter low.
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I stand corrected. My #sourdough starter was very active for about 24h after the first feeding, but it's gone back to being relatively inert. It's been a week since I started this batch and it's barely rising at all any more.

I've started keeping it in an insulated bag after feeding, but only since the last two feedings. I'm wondering if it's possibly due to the fact that instead of putting it back in the same glass jar, I put it in a freshly washed one after every feeding (because I tend to spill starter all over the jar making a mess of it when I measure it out).

The proportions I'm using to feed it are: 113g of starter, 1 cup of bread flour, 1/2 cup of warm water. I do this every 12 hours (+/-15 minutes or so).

The recipe says it should be good to go after 5 or 6 days, but I've heard of people needing up to three weeks to get a viable starter going.

#AskFedi
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

I grew 3 or 4 starters from scratch and it always happened exactly like you describe. Keep feeding it regularly and wait, as long as it doesn't grow mold (or gets weird smells or colors) you are good. If by 3 weeks it doesn't at least double in 12 hours, then there is a problem with flour or water. It works in 3 days or 3 wks depending on the flour, the microorganisms that are in it or on your hands, whether there is already a starter living around, etc. I am sure it will work for you too 😀

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