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Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby ZeroCook » Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:12 am

Gillthepainter wrote: it was always well colonized, hence why I could leave it for a long time untouched.


Ditto. I still have some. :D Do they change over time? Mine lives in the fridge. Due for a refresh. Time for a multigrain or some NY Rye bagels I think.

For those unfamiliar with the WildYeast blog out of San Fransisco - no posts for a while but still one of the best and a great recipe index.
http://www.wildyeastblog.com/

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Gillthepainter » Mon Feb 08, 2021 9:24 am

It is indeed an excellent site. I've used it many times, especially in my early sourdough days.
I seem to remember there wasn't an question that hadn't been dealt with in detail on there.

Changing over time, I presume they do, Zero.
Unless you can keep it in consistent conditions.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby aero280 » Sun Feb 21, 2021 12:16 am

I have just discovered a roll of chilled puff pastry at the back of the fridge. Best before was mid-December :oops:

It isn’t useable, but it smells of pear drops exactly like my sourdough starter. I wonder if this could be turned into a starter? I can’t really see why not...

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Binky » Sun Feb 21, 2021 1:13 pm

Need your input here folks.

I bought a sourdough starter from Lakeland and OH is baking today. He usually bakes from scratch and has made proper loaves of sourdough in the past (when we lived in the US and could get starter easily from a baking buddy).

He thinks the proportions of water to flour are incorrect but has made a start and says he will on this occasion stick to the instructions. The 'dough' in the bowl isn't a dough as we know it, more a sticky gloop of watery flour. I said maybe the grains will burst in the next 48 hrs and make it a 'handleable' dough. What do you think?


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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Gillthepainter » Sun Feb 21, 2021 2:01 pm

As your OH is a confident baker, I'd run with the very hydrated results, and see what you get.
The 2 loaves when it comes to baking, can always be put in a tin if the dough lakes structure.

I'm reminded of poolish, the french version of making a sourdough.
The results are rather runny, off puttingly so.

With the other sachets, you can then work out how much water to use next time.

Aero,
not really sure what you are trying to get from old freezer pastry, have you seen a way of making bread from pastry?

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Binky » Sun Feb 21, 2021 2:09 pm

This is what his sourdough bread usually looks like, following a standard US recipe

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The new batch will have to go in tins as you say Gill. We have bannetons but fear the mix will ooze through the gaps....

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Gillthepainter » Sun Feb 21, 2021 2:20 pm

Yum! :mug:
It sounds a bit disappointing, with alarm bells a-ringing at the amount of water involved on the sachet.
I'll be very interested in knowing if the bread works really well in the end.

I do wonder sometimes if these recipes on packets are written & performed by expert bakers/ cooks.
And don't take into account the handling by the novice and home baker.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Pampy » Sun Feb 21, 2021 2:23 pm

I'm not normally a sourdough lover but my word, that looks good!

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Suffs » Sun Feb 21, 2021 2:33 pm

I use 375ml to 500gms strong white flour and a cupful of starter the texture of toothpaste, if that's any help. It does start very wet ... I stretch and fold it after an hour and it begins to firm up ... then it goes in the fridge overnight by which time its a good stretchy soft dough, and is knocked back, proved for an hour and baked.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby aero280 » Sun Feb 21, 2021 3:35 pm

Gillthepainter wrote:Aero,
not really sure what you are trying to get from old freezer pastry, have you seen a way of making bread from pastry?


I'm not planning anything. In fact I threw it out! The pastry was in the fridge and not the freezer. It was well past its best before date, but I had a look and gave it a sniff. but, although it looked and smelt beyond use as pasty, I was expecting it to smell rancid or mouldy, but it didn't. It smelt exactly like my sourdough starter. So I just wondered if it could be used as such. I suppose it's the same as any other old dough left in the fridge for a few days, which is what a sourdough starter is...

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Pampy » Sun Feb 21, 2021 3:38 pm

Mouldy Old Dough? .....I'll get my coat! :lol: :lol:

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby dennispc » Sun Feb 21, 2021 5:14 pm

That amount of water looks a lot to me, but it’s a long time since I’ve made sourdough so can’t offer any advice. The loaf in the photo looks fine. I’d eat it!

Moving on, a friend sent me this

https://www.thegiftofbread.org/

The possibility of a £10 video looks attractive, but for those in travelling distance of Martock might like a day there at some time in the future.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby ZeroCook » Sun Feb 21, 2021 5:49 pm

.

Binky - I think your OH is right and that the quantities are incorrect - the hydration for that recipe comes out to 97% which is actually more like a starter refresh hydration. Bread dough hydrations usually vary between 60-75%. I would simply calculate and add/mix in more flour to get a hydration that works.

Packaging and label recipes are very hit and miss in my experience and I tend to avoid them.



aero280 wrote:I have just discovered a roll of chilled puff pastry at the back of the fridge. Best before was mid-December :oops:

It isn’t useable, but it smells of pear drops exactly like my sourdough starter. I wonder if this could be turned into a starter? I can’t really see why not...


Aero. :o
Really glad you didn't :D :lol:
Think of the butter/oil and other old stuff in there that would have made up the starter :?

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Binky » Sun Feb 21, 2021 7:41 pm

The mix has doubled in size. 9hrs at 21 degrees C. This will be interesting.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Pampy » Mon Feb 22, 2021 12:04 am

It certainly looks like a lovely little number! :clap :clap

ETA - I meant a lively little number!
Last edited by Pampy on Mon Feb 22, 2021 6:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Gillthepainter » Mon Feb 22, 2021 2:40 pm

Good luck folding that foaming beauty.
It looks nice and active.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby ZeroCook » Mon Feb 22, 2021 6:17 pm

:lol: :lol: :lol:

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby Binky » Tue Feb 23, 2021 11:02 am

More flour added to balance out the hydration/flour ratio as suggested upthread. Sitting in the bannetons now.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby dennispc » Sat Mar 06, 2021 2:17 pm

The latest Lakeland catalogue has the usual Panasonic bread maker, but is now offering a sough dough one - £249.99. Claims it can produceda starter in 24 hours rather than five days and a loaf in five hours.

Don’t think I’ll put it on my Christmas list.

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Re: Sourdough ... your experience and tips please

Postby jeral » Sat Mar 06, 2021 3:33 pm

Do you think that the sourdough breadmaker uses the same quick technique that some supermarket pretend sourdough loaves use?

I recall established baker's websites which say that digestibility of ordinary wheat items like bread and pizza is improved (no indigestion) if the recipe is written for a longer proving time (usually meaning less yeast). Therefore, to my way of thinking, if digestibility is the main plus point for some people of sourdough, a speedy mix would presumably defeat that aspect.

Just hypothesising, although £249 could be an expensive mistake if so.

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