I don't know why but all of a sudden I wanted to make a sourdough starter. I've never started one before and I've never baked any sourdough bread before. All I know if I like the taste of sourdough. I tend to just buy it or eat it when it is served at a restaurant. I did some online research. I could get some dried sourdough starter but I am an impatience person. I decided to capture the wild yeast on my own. I also sent for some free Oregon Trail starter from friends of Carl. It will take up to six weeks to get the free starter.
I'm testing out two methods. The first method (A aka Aki) is from a woman on the freshloaf.com discussion board and uses a mixture of rye, wheat, and pineapple juice. The second method (B or Barry) is a more traditional method of wheat flour and water.
Day 1 (January 26, 2009):
I decided on using organic hard red winter wheatberries that I purchased from Vitamin Cottage a couple weeks ago. I read that freshly milled flour works best since a lot of the yeast spores are on the outside of the grain. Why do I happen to have wheatberries at home when I don't grind my own flour? I like the taste of cooked wheatberries with maple syrup.
I ground my wheatberries in my little Cucina Bella Rocket multi-purpose machine. It is like a Magic Bullet machine but prettier. I've used it for smoothies, flax seeds, anise seeds, nuts...
I started off with just water and ground wheatberries. Later I read about the pineapple juice and decided to experiment but I didn't take updated pictures. I added pineapple juice to Aki and then started Barry with ground wheatberries, bread flour, and water.
Day 2 (January 27, 2009):
Since I didn't see much activity in the morning, I went out and bought rye berries (and also rye flour). I got the rye flour first and then stopped by a second store and found rye berries. I did the same thing and ground it in my Cucina Bella. 
24 hours: Starter A (Aki). A few hours after adding the rye. I see little bubbles on the surface. It smells like bread dough with a faint tropical scent.
24 hours: Starter B (Barry). Still no activity. Smells good to me but maybe it is just me. I like the smell of flour and water.
Day 3 (January 28, 2009):
36 hours: Aki still has just a few bubbles. Scent is pleasant.
Aki side view. It hasn't increased in volume.
36 hours: Barry has really forged ahead of Aki. I was surprised to see all the bubbles. Barry's bubbles are bigger than Aki's. Barry also is starting to smell really bad. I don't know how to describe it. Maybe like sour milk. It is not intolerable just yet but I have a feeling it will start to get really bad. According to my research on the internet, this is where the bad bacteria takes over. It will get really big. (If you look at the picture below of the side view, you can see that it has increased in volume to about the same size as Aki. When I went to bed last night, Aki was twice the volume of Barry. I used more flour in Aki.) After a while the bad bacteria will start to produce lactic and acetic acid and will kill the bad smelly bacteria. The starter will shrink and look dead. But I can't give up. Eventually something called lactobacillus will take over and I will have a nice symbiotic culture of lactobacilli and wild yeast. I won't have lactobacillus sanfranciscensis, the name of the strain found in San Francisco sourdough. But I will have some sort of lactobacilli; probably a mix of the flora of where the grain was grown and lactobacillus denverisinensis (I totally made up this word).
36 hours: Barry has doubled in volume in the last 12 hours. 
Aki 48 hours: Approximately five hours after today's feeding with 2 tablespoons of organic rye flour.
Barry 48 hours: Approximately five hours after feeding with 2 tablespoons of organic wheat flour. Barry went flat. No bubbles. No signs of life. Even the awful stench he had earlier in the day had disappear. If I wasn't home sick today, I probably would have missed all the action. I gave Barry some aeration just as Peter Reinhart suggested. I hope this will help him out. I must not give up. It just means that the bad bacteria leuconostoc has finally killed itself off and I must wait for the good bacteria to establish itself. The byproducts of the leuconostoc bacteria created an acidic environment that the good bacteria will thrive in.
Approximately 72 hours: Aki doesn't look like she has developed many more bubbles. This picture was taken prior to the evening feeding. I'm not sure what I am doing wrong. Aki should be producing more bubbles.
Approximately 72 hrs: Barry has a few big bubble holes underneath the layer of liquid on top. The liquid has separated from the gooey mass. I want to see more action.
Side view of Barry at 72 hours. He has bubbles throughout. I couldn't get a good side picture of Aki but there wasn't much happening on the side.
Day 5 (January 30, 2009): Not too much going on today. Last night I felt that I was not feeding the starters enough. I don't want too much of each starter so as I added more and more flour each day, the amount grew. However, I was not feeding it double the food each day. I was only sticking with about three tablespoons of flour. So I decided to scoop out 1/4 cup of each into a new container and feed both with a quarter cup flour. I kept the rest of the old starter in their containers just in case it didn't work. Not much was going on this morning. Not much was going on when I got home. I fed both when I got home tonight. The feeding was a little late. I'll check on them just before going to bed.
Day 7 (February 1, 2009): I didn't take any pictures today. It just looks like batter right now. I fed them in the morning. Later that night I decided to go for a stiffer starter. I used less water.
Day 8 (February 2, 2009): I thought that by reducing the liquid, I would get some rise. I read that a liquid starter doesn't double. I converted to a firmer starter. I see a couple bubbles in Barry but that is it. The bubbling doesn't break the surface. When I got home today, Barry was a little more liquid and flat. When I make a stiff starter, I cannot really get it flat and smooth. I started to use pineapple juice again.
Day 9 (February 3, 2009): I'm so excited! This morning when I checked the starters they were both bubbly. Barry even increased in volume! I fed both with flour and bottled water because that was what I had upstairs. I left both pretty thick. When I came upstairs at about 6 pm, they both increased in volume and turned fairly liquid. Barry even doubled himself. I took a whiff of Barry and when I did I knew that some magical had happen. Barry's smell had changed entirely. It is developed and full of different fragrance notes. I can smells the difference between Aki and Barry. Aki smells like how Barry smelled earlier in the day.
When I stirred Barry, he let out some gas but re-inflated himself up quickly. He no longer had the thick pancake batter consistency but more like yeasted dough. When I dip the chopstick or a spoon in to stir, I can see the strands. He was nice an airy. Aki is falling behind a bit. I have a good feeling she will do just fine but she is just not as developed as Barry. I dumped out half of each starter and fed them bread flour and pineapple juice. I don't weigh or do exact measurements. I just eyeball it.
I'm not sure if I am getting the days correct. It has been a week and a day since I began this process but I counted the first day as day 1 instead of day 0. So now I think we are actually on day 8 and not day 9.
Day 10 (February 4, 2009): I took Barry to work with me today. I wanted to test out a different feeding schedule. I've been feeding both about every 12 hours. It was getting too much. When I woke up this morning, Barry was more than double his volume. I took Barry and some flour to work with me and he sat on my desk all day. At about 2:00, Barry was triple/quadrupled in volume. I read some more about feedings. One freshloaf poster said that she waited until a little after the peak to feed her starter. After peaking, the starter will start to cave in in the middle. I took out half and put into another container for a co-worker. I sent him home with some instructions. I didn't feed Barry until the 24 hour mark.
Barry smells really good. I can really tell a difference because my pineapple/rye starter is still a little behind. It smells fine and I can tell there is something happening but the smell completely changes when the starter is ready. It smells sour yet sweet at the same time. I don't know how to describe the smell other than the smell of a good ferment. It smells a little like Odwalla apple juice a few hours after if has been feed. The smells then changes to a little more sour but with sweet notes. The starter also feels alive. When I stirred it down and gave some away, the starter continued to grow. The smells changed slightly as the starter aged during the day. It still smelled good but a little more pungent. I fed both a little past 6:00 pm. I just checked (about 2.5 hours) and Barry is almost doubled again. Aki (the pineapple/rye) has bubbles but no noticeable rise yet. I suspect that Aki will soon transform.
This is the starter about 2.5 hours after feeding. It has doubled. It continued to increase through the night and into the morning. I experimented and tried to not feed it every 12 hours. I took Barry to work with me in order to make my observations. I notice the peak is about 18-19 hours after feeding and then it starts to shrink again. It is much happier with twice a day feedings so I've been doing that.
February 6, 2009. I feed Barry and put him in the refrigerator. He is nice and strong so it was time to stop wasting flour. I'll bring him out a day or two before baking. I'm not keeping too much on hand so I'll have to build it a few days before using.
February 8, 2009. Aki (the rye and pineapple starter) finally has some faint signs of a starter. The smell is starting to turn in the right direction. She was able to turn the stiff consistency into a more liquid consistency. She also increased in volume. I didn't feed her on Saturday at all. I fed her on Friday evening and ignored her on Saturday. I remembered to check on Sunday morning and it wasn't rancid as I expected it to be. I was ready to toss the entire contents.
So this experiment was to test out some of the methods for sourdough starter on the internet. Below are some assumptions on the internet:
- Yeast is more prevalent on rye. I didn't notice much difference between using rye or wheat. Barry, the wheatberry & unbleached flour combination is doing much better than the rye. I've even weaned the rye starter off of the rye by slowing decreasing the amount of rye used in each feeding.
- Yeast is more prevalent on organic whole grains. I started both with whole grains. For some reason I was not convinced that the little yeasties survived being milled and stored in sacks for the last few weeks or months. I thought my best luck was on the hull of freshly milled flour.
- Pineapple helps maintain the pH that good lactobacillus thrives in and discourages the growth of bad bacteria. The pineapple starter never developed a bad smell. The plain water starter only smelled bad for less than a day. After the smell, it sorta went dormant for a few days but when it came back, it came back immediately. The pineapple starter never really had too many transformations. It is timid and quiet. The bubbles are small. It is actually pretty slow to develop. It is really slow to develop. Almost twice as long as the water starter. With the water starter, I saw a transformation over night.
- Potato water attracts wild yeast. I didn't use any potato water or potato flakes. I didn't want to have another starter to watch over. Two is plenty.
- Wild yeast is found on grapes and other fruit. I'm not sure where I would find wild grapes at this time of year in Denver. I was also not convinced that the yeast on grapes is the kind of yeast I wanted. I read that it is a different strain that will eventually be killed off by the sourdough yeast. I even read about a woman who took a leaf cutting from an oak tree, soak the cutting and soaked it in water and used the water for her starter. I thought "weird".
- Yeast is captured in the wild air. I began this in January. Although this year's winter is a little mild and some days temps actually get to 70 degrees, I was not planning on leaving my container outside, exposed to the elements. It could potentially freeze. I live in a neighborhood where we don't have private outside spaces. Everything is shared. We have a lot of dogs and kids in the neighborhood. I wasn't sure what kind of wild cultures I would be capturing. I kept the starter in an extra bedroom that no one has ever really lived in. I also have an air purifier to capture all the wild microns in the air. I'm convinced that the yeast was on the grain and not in the air.
What I learned:
- Patience: You must be very patient with this. It helped that I was busy these past few weeks so I was only able to check in on them periodically. Most of the time I was either at work, out, or sleeping.
- Must not lose heart: A few days into this and when nothing happens, it is difficult to continue to nurture and feed the darn things but it you persevere, one day you will be rewarded with something magical.
- Less is more: You don't need fancy here. Remember that people have been doing this for a long long time and they did not have anything fancy. Pineapple juice is not necessary. I don't think it hurts anything (well maybe just slow it down a bit).
Next is the sourdough bread. I have dreams of making sourdough loaves, sourdough english muffins, sourdough pancakes, sourdough pizza crust...the endless possibilities. With just a little patience, I may never have to buy yeast again...well maybe for some recipes.
I dried some Barry starter on one of the plastic lids of my corningware. I spread out a thin layer of the flour paste the night before. I woke up in the morning and the mixture was almost dried and the coolest thing happened - the thin layer bubbled up. See the big bubbles of dough? It is amazing!
Barry 48 hours: Approximately five hours after feeding with 2 tablespoons of organic wheat flour. Barry went flat. No bubbles. No signs of life. Even the awful stench he had earlier in the day had disappear. If I wasn't home sick today, I probably would have missed all the action. I gave Barry some aeration just as Peter Reinhart suggested. I hope this will help him out. I must not give up. It just means that the bad bacteria leuconostoc has finally killed itself off and I must wait for the good bacteria to establish itself. The byproducts of the leuconostoc bacteria created an acidic environment that the good bacteria will thrive in.
Day 4 (January 29, 2009): No am shots. I checked them in the morning before work and they looked the same. Not much progress. I took the pictures below prior to feeding. I'll leave them alone and check again to see if I see anything exciting happen. This whole experiment is taking a lot of my time. I have to keep track of the pictures. I'm glad I am blogging as I go because I do not know if I can keep the pictures straight if I decided to blog at the end of the experiment. I will be so upset if this fails.
Approximately 72 hours: Aki doesn't look like she has developed many more bubbles. This picture was taken prior to the evening feeding. I'm not sure what I am doing wrong. Aki should be producing more bubbles.
Approximately 72 hrs: Barry has a few big bubble holes underneath the layer of liquid on top. The liquid has separated from the gooey mass. I want to see more action.
Side view of Barry at 72 hours. He has bubbles throughout. I couldn't get a good side picture of Aki but there wasn't much happening on the side.
Day 5 (January 30, 2009): Not too much going on today. Last night I felt that I was not feeding the starters enough. I don't want too much of each starter so as I added more and more flour each day, the amount grew. However, I was not feeding it double the food each day. I was only sticking with about three tablespoons of flour. So I decided to scoop out 1/4 cup of each into a new container and feed both with a quarter cup flour. I kept the rest of the old starter in their containers just in case it didn't work. Not much was going on this morning. Not much was going on when I got home. I fed both when I got home tonight. The feeding was a little late. I'll check on them just before going to bed.
Aki
Barry
Day 6 (January 31, 2009): I'm starting to feel like the only activity is from the bacteria. I pretty much only kept a little of the original and fed it more flour. I stopped the pineapple juice. I feel the bubbles are from bacteria and not from the yeast.
Day 6 (January 31, 2009): I'm starting to feel like the only activity is from the bacteria. I pretty much only kept a little of the original and fed it more flour. I stopped the pineapple juice. I feel the bubbles are from bacteria and not from the yeast.Aki has a few bubbles but mainly from me aerating it.
Barry seems a little more active with bigger bubbles.
Another picture of Barry but this time was a night picture.
Another picture of Barry but this time was a night picture.
Day 7 (February 1, 2009): I didn't take any pictures today. It just looks like batter right now. I fed them in the morning. Later that night I decided to go for a stiffer starter. I used less water.
Day 8 (February 2, 2009): I thought that by reducing the liquid, I would get some rise. I read that a liquid starter doesn't double. I converted to a firmer starter. I see a couple bubbles in Barry but that is it. The bubbling doesn't break the surface. When I got home today, Barry was a little more liquid and flat. When I make a stiff starter, I cannot really get it flat and smooth. I started to use pineapple juice again.
Day 9 (February 3, 2009): I'm so excited! This morning when I checked the starters they were both bubbly. Barry even increased in volume! I fed both with flour and bottled water because that was what I had upstairs. I left both pretty thick. When I came upstairs at about 6 pm, they both increased in volume and turned fairly liquid. Barry even doubled himself. I took a whiff of Barry and when I did I knew that some magical had happen. Barry's smell had changed entirely. It is developed and full of different fragrance notes. I can smells the difference between Aki and Barry. Aki smells like how Barry smelled earlier in the day.
When I stirred Barry, he let out some gas but re-inflated himself up quickly. He no longer had the thick pancake batter consistency but more like yeasted dough. When I dip the chopstick or a spoon in to stir, I can see the strands. He was nice an airy. Aki is falling behind a bit. I have a good feeling she will do just fine but she is just not as developed as Barry. I dumped out half of each starter and fed them bread flour and pineapple juice. I don't weigh or do exact measurements. I just eyeball it.
I'm not sure if I am getting the days correct. It has been a week and a day since I began this process but I counted the first day as day 1 instead of day 0. So now I think we are actually on day 8 and not day 9.
Aki:
Barry:
Barry side view: I marked the container with some scotch tape to see where I started.
Day 10 (February 4, 2009): I took Barry to work with me today. I wanted to test out a different feeding schedule. I've been feeding both about every 12 hours. It was getting too much. When I woke up this morning, Barry was more than double his volume. I took Barry and some flour to work with me and he sat on my desk all day. At about 2:00, Barry was triple/quadrupled in volume. I read some more about feedings. One freshloaf poster said that she waited until a little after the peak to feed her starter. After peaking, the starter will start to cave in in the middle. I took out half and put into another container for a co-worker. I sent him home with some instructions. I didn't feed Barry until the 24 hour mark.
Barry smells really good. I can really tell a difference because my pineapple/rye starter is still a little behind. It smells fine and I can tell there is something happening but the smell completely changes when the starter is ready. It smells sour yet sweet at the same time. I don't know how to describe the smell other than the smell of a good ferment. It smells a little like Odwalla apple juice a few hours after if has been feed. The smells then changes to a little more sour but with sweet notes. The starter also feels alive. When I stirred it down and gave some away, the starter continued to grow. The smells changed slightly as the starter aged during the day. It still smelled good but a little more pungent. I fed both a little past 6:00 pm. I just checked (about 2.5 hours) and Barry is almost doubled again. Aki (the pineapple/rye) has bubbles but no noticeable rise yet. I suspect that Aki will soon transform.
This is a picture of the starter after a feeding around 6:00 pm.
This is the starter about 2.5 hours after feeding. It has doubled. It continued to increase through the night and into the morning. I experimented and tried to not feed it every 12 hours. I took Barry to work with me in order to make my observations. I notice the peak is about 18-19 hours after feeding and then it starts to shrink again. It is much happier with twice a day feedings so I've been doing that.
February 6, 2009. I feed Barry and put him in the refrigerator. He is nice and strong so it was time to stop wasting flour. I'll bring him out a day or two before baking. I'm not keeping too much on hand so I'll have to build it a few days before using.
February 8, 2009. Aki (the rye and pineapple starter) finally has some faint signs of a starter. The smell is starting to turn in the right direction. She was able to turn the stiff consistency into a more liquid consistency. She also increased in volume. I didn't feed her on Saturday at all. I fed her on Friday evening and ignored her on Saturday. I remembered to check on Sunday morning and it wasn't rancid as I expected it to be. I was ready to toss the entire contents.
So this experiment was to test out some of the methods for sourdough starter on the internet. Below are some assumptions on the internet:
- Yeast is more prevalent on rye. I didn't notice much difference between using rye or wheat. Barry, the wheatberry & unbleached flour combination is doing much better than the rye. I've even weaned the rye starter off of the rye by slowing decreasing the amount of rye used in each feeding.
- Yeast is more prevalent on organic whole grains. I started both with whole grains. For some reason I was not convinced that the little yeasties survived being milled and stored in sacks for the last few weeks or months. I thought my best luck was on the hull of freshly milled flour.
- Pineapple helps maintain the pH that good lactobacillus thrives in and discourages the growth of bad bacteria. The pineapple starter never developed a bad smell. The plain water starter only smelled bad for less than a day. After the smell, it sorta went dormant for a few days but when it came back, it came back immediately. The pineapple starter never really had too many transformations. It is timid and quiet. The bubbles are small. It is actually pretty slow to develop. It is really slow to develop. Almost twice as long as the water starter. With the water starter, I saw a transformation over night.
- Potato water attracts wild yeast. I didn't use any potato water or potato flakes. I didn't want to have another starter to watch over. Two is plenty.
- Wild yeast is found on grapes and other fruit. I'm not sure where I would find wild grapes at this time of year in Denver. I was also not convinced that the yeast on grapes is the kind of yeast I wanted. I read that it is a different strain that will eventually be killed off by the sourdough yeast. I even read about a woman who took a leaf cutting from an oak tree, soak the cutting and soaked it in water and used the water for her starter. I thought "weird".
- Yeast is captured in the wild air. I began this in January. Although this year's winter is a little mild and some days temps actually get to 70 degrees, I was not planning on leaving my container outside, exposed to the elements. It could potentially freeze. I live in a neighborhood where we don't have private outside spaces. Everything is shared. We have a lot of dogs and kids in the neighborhood. I wasn't sure what kind of wild cultures I would be capturing. I kept the starter in an extra bedroom that no one has ever really lived in. I also have an air purifier to capture all the wild microns in the air. I'm convinced that the yeast was on the grain and not in the air.
What I learned:
- Patience: You must be very patient with this. It helped that I was busy these past few weeks so I was only able to check in on them periodically. Most of the time I was either at work, out, or sleeping.
- Must not lose heart: A few days into this and when nothing happens, it is difficult to continue to nurture and feed the darn things but it you persevere, one day you will be rewarded with something magical.
- Less is more: You don't need fancy here. Remember that people have been doing this for a long long time and they did not have anything fancy. Pineapple juice is not necessary. I don't think it hurts anything (well maybe just slow it down a bit).
Next is the sourdough bread. I have dreams of making sourdough loaves, sourdough english muffins, sourdough pancakes, sourdough pizza crust...the endless possibilities. With just a little patience, I may never have to buy yeast again...well maybe for some recipes.
I dried some Barry starter on one of the plastic lids of my corningware. I spread out a thin layer of the flour paste the night before. I woke up in the morning and the mixture was almost dried and the coolest thing happened - the thin layer bubbled up. See the big bubbles of dough? It is amazing!
8 comments:
Awsome! I just started my sourdough starter 2 days ago. It was just whole wheat flour and water.
It bubbled up to the top of my container in 24 hours, and had a foul smell. today the foul smell is still there and there is no bubbling.
I hope mine has not gone bad. Your blog has inspired me to forge ahead and see what happens.
thanks
Adam
Adam,
You must not give up. The first few days you will have big bubbles and the starter will smell pretty bad. It will then die down and be almost dormant but if you continue to feed it each day, you will be rewarded with sourdough.
Please keep me updated on the progress. I still have three starters in my fridge.
malisa
I started my sourdough starter "experiment" on May 3rd at 9:30pm. So today is the third day.
The mixture has separated into what seems to be equal parts. It has a brown liquid floating on top of the flour paste.
I have the mixture in a shallow but long glass cake pan. I used this so I could place it on top of the refrigerator. I placed plastic rap over the pan to cover it.
Today it still has the same foul odor that it had yesterday. It smells like realy smelly socks or shoes or something.
I am going to feed it with equal parts whole wheat flour and water. I will continue to feed it this way each day.
My mother gave me a bag of Amish Friendship bread starter. which seems to be just another form of sour dough. If my sour dough starter does not come around in a week or so, I will start another batch using the friendship bread starter.
Thanks for your encouragement.
Adam
Do your 3 starters behave differently and produce different tasting breads or baked items?
adam,
they do taste and behave differently. my wheat berry and water starter (barry) is very sour and takes a long time to rise. my rye berry and pineapple juice starter (aki) is very mild tasting and semi-vigorous. my oregon trail starter has a very nice flavor sort of between the other two starters. it is the most vigorous starter out of the three. i feed them every week and i am very careful not to cross-contaminate. i think they will eventually start to be very similar since i feed them the same flour. some people swear that they smell different but to me they all smell the same. the smell changes depending on the length of time between feedings.
Hello again,
I've been feeding my starter every day, and it has progressively smelled a little better each day.
At the moment it is starting to get a sweet sour smell, though still remanence of the dirty socks smell it started with.
It started bubbling again a couple days ago, though it does not double in size. There are only small bubbles throughout the dough, with a bit of white froth on top. Not sure if this is good or bad.
I've been reading everything I can find online. The information varies quite a bit.
I think this FAQ was very informative, so I thought I'd share it.
ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet-by-group/news.answers/food/sourdough/starters
thanks
interesting site. i also read a lot about starters since i was very anxious about my starters. it does take a while to start a starter from scratch. it took a lot less time when i used carl's oregon starter i received in the mail.
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