I made up my dough as usual from my starter (which smells fine) and when it had risen to about twice the size I had a smell - initially it was what I would expect but air from inside the dough then came out smelling a wee bit like farts. Is this a sign of bad things to come?
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... should I bother to carry on and bake it?
I suggest baking and see what happens. All starters are different. I created one myself and the bread had a good rise but I did not like the taste, if this starter bakes bread you don't like get another starter. When I need a starter I go to my local bakery and ask for some, they know me and are happy to share. A starter from a bakery should not produce bread that smells like a fart or they would not be in business long, LOL If the new starter has the same problem then you need to look at how you bake and what you use. I use starter, water, milk and oil as my wet, flour, salt, sugar as my dry, works well for me.
So I went ahead and baked it - the resulting bread seems to be fine, no unfortunate smells or digestive side-effects. I did an experiment to see whether it might be one of the flours or the rye starter, fermenting each flour (rye, wholemeal and white) separately with a little starter and water. All were fine and smelt right, even after 24hours or so.
Perhaps my starter was just having a tantrum.