Greetings from SFO!

[wtg]

Looks delish!!

I used my rye-fed starter today. I used my usual recipe (I weigh everything) and the dough is extremely sticky. I finally gave up and kneaded in some additional bread flour and got it to something I could at least handle. It's rising again. I'll see how it looks in a couple of hours. If it's risen reasonably, I'll form the loaf and put the proofing basket in the frig overnight and then bake tomorrow morning.

I tried a little of the dough and it is SOUR. Can't wait to see how it bakes up. I made corned beef today so it could chill overnight for easier slicing and hoping upon hope that I have a successful loaf so we can have corned beef sandwiches tomorrow for lunch.

[Steve Miller]

Do you guys put salt in your starter?

I’ve read that it makes the starter more sturdy - they call it “training the starter”.

[wtg]

I have not salted the starter. I don’t recall any of the blogs I’ve looked at mentioning it. Will check it out!

[Jodi]

No. No salt in my starter. I warm the water up a little and dissolve the salt in it. I mix part of my flour with the salty water first, they put the starter in.

[Jodi]

Thinking about this more - don’t know what the point is. Why make life harder for your starter? It’s not like you kill it off when you mix your bread recipe together.

[Steve Miller]

The theory is that if your starter is raised with salt in it then being combined with the salt in the dough won’t slow it down.

It’s one of many questionable assertions I’ve found bouncing around YouTube and Reddit.

[wtg]

Like @Jodi I don't put the salt directly on the starter when I'm putting together the ingredients to make a loaf of bread. I start with the starter (!), then put water on that, dump in the flour and sprinkle the salt on top of the flour. Stir everything together.

I do remember making a loaf of bread when I was a kid. The bread came out looking very nice, but much puffier and larger than usual. I cut a slice and buttered it and it became obvious why the loaf looked so different than usual. I forgot to put in the salt.

[Jodi]

@Steve-Miller said in Greetings from SFO!:

The theory is that if your starter is raised with salt in it then being combined with the salt in the dough won’t slow it down.

It’s one of many questionable assertions I’ve found bouncing around YouTube and Reddit.

Lots of things people do that make this more way more complicated than it needs to be! Temperature is one of the biggest factors in how fast it rises. I let the bread I made yesterday rise on the counter, it took a couple hours longer than it does in the oven with the light on. But since it didn’t matter when I baked it, it didn’t matter how long it took. And I could have just stuck it in the fridge and let it proof overnight and baked it this morning. Sourdough is something you just have to be willing to be flexible with, depending on your conditions/environment at the time.

[Steve Miller]

She’s dead, Captain. The starter sleeps with the fishes.

It never really did much, got a bit lighter but never changed size. One or two bubbles. Today was the end of it - crusted over and smelled bad.

I may have done too many things. Different flours, sometimes discard, sometimes not. This time I’ll pick one method and stick with it.

Onward - In to the fog!

[Jodi]

Use 100% rye flour, bobs red mill. Don’t add any other kind of flour until it’s going. It took mine a couple of weeks at least. Water needs to have no chlorine. Make sure your spoons are clean.

https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/rye-sourdough-starter-in-easy-steps/

[Steve Miller]

I’ve now made 2. One traditional with Rye flour, one using dehydrated starter from England that Sharon got me for Christmas. That one used unbleached bread flour.

Kitchen temp 69 degrees - I think putting in the oven even with just the light on may have baked it. Water temp used was 90F. Flour temp 69F. Distilled water.

Early results are encouraging - I’m getting bubbles!

[Jodi]

Yay!!

[wtg]

I read somewhere that distilled water isn't the best idea.

Of course I've also read that you shouldn't use chlorinated water, and all I've ever used is water directly out of the tap and have had no issues.

[Steve Miller]

Maybe bottled drinking water?

Maybe I’ll take some of the discard and feed it with tap water and see what happens. I have lots of jars and the tap water doesn’t smell like chlorine so…

[wtg]

That, or just do what @jodi does and pour some tap water into a container and leave it out to let the chlorine dissipate.

[Jodi]

You can just boil your tap water and cool it and then use it. Keep container in the fridge. Most tap water has chlorine added. Even if you can’t smell it. And wtg said her tap water works, so maybe yours won’t have enough to matter and will too. I’ve just always let it dissipate out of mine because that’s what was suggested.

[wtg]

@Steve-Miller

I've never tried drying starter. If you get desperate, I can dry some of mine and send it to you. King Arthur has instructions for the whole process, from drying it, storing it, and reviving it:

https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2015/05/01/putting-sourdough-starter-hold

[Jodi]

I dried some of mine a couple of years ago. It’s easy here, we are so dry. Keep meaning to set up a test with it, and one from scratch to see if it goes faster.

[wtg]

First attempt at sourdough challah in the oven. Meant to take a pic before it went in, and when I remembered, didn't want to open the oven and drop the temp.

Recipe was not good. The dough was more of a batter after I got to the end of the mixing stage. Had to add a ton more flour to get anything resembling the proper consistency. Rose modestly overnight and after I cut it into pieces and braided it into a loaf.

We'll see how it turns out, but I think I'll go with the King Arthur recipe for my next loaf.

I didn't need another baking utensil, but I bought a pullman loaf pan. That's the next bread experiment, probably next week.

[wtg]

Getting there. Smells fabulous.