Dear all
I turn to you in despair because I'm really struggling with my starter. I have been baking successful sourdough for almost three years, using the same starter, reviving 100g of it with equal parts flour and water, baking twice a week. Everything was fine until I went on vacation in July and forgot to put it in the fridge during a very hot spell.
When I came back, it was hoochy and not very nice smelling so I spent 10 days trying to revive it, and although it would form bubbles, it never doubled in size. The best I got after was about a 20% bulk increase.
I decided that I had probably killed it so I decided to throw in the towel and make a new starter, which I did last Monday. I followed Dan Lepard's recipe. But despite carefully feeding it every 24 hours, it also refused to take off. After 9 days, I started twice-daily feedings which I've been doing now for four days, and I'm still not getting any proper fermentation. I get a few surface bubbles after a few hours, then a few more, then by about 8 hours, it's tiny bubbles but still no volume.
Does anyone have any ideas to help me? I'm getting kind of frustrated!!
It's pretty hot here at the moment, 26°C in the house (79°F).
Thank you for any advice!
Anna
Replies
Hello Anna,
Not sure what Dan's method is but I have found that the method outlined by SourDom on this site is hard to beat.
I think a couple of the secrets are to use at least some proportion of a wholemeal flour (rye seems to have more beasties and good enzymes than wheat it seems) and certainly don't use highly processed/bleached flour to maximise the chances of introducing the wild yeasts and bacteria that you need.
Good luck with your projects.
Farinam
As Farinam suggests, a wholemeal flour is the secret here as the surface of the grain is "where the wild things are". And of late I am more inclined toward organic grain and flour, if that's possible for you.
Just did a search for the legendary Sourdom's method and it's here:
http://sourdough.com/blog/sourdom/beginners-blog-starter-scratch
Let us know how you get on. In the scheme of things, 13-odd days of feeding from scratch isn't a very long time yet. Persistence will get you there.
Dan