Entry tags:
Sourdough starter
I've participated in a couple of home science experiments/data-gathering projects for the Public Science Projects outfit. (Your Wild Life and Showerhead Microbiome, if you're curious.)
Last week they sent out a new one, Wild Sourdough, where you make a sourdough starter following their instructions and after two weeks you take some measurements, make some observations, and report back to them.
They're interested in what different starters in different areas of the country (and maybe world?) do, as the strains of yeast in the air are different everywhere. They're also interested in data from starters made with different flours, and starters placed inside and outside the house. I chose not to put any outside the house because I don't want tomcats spraying the jars (there's no good place I can keep cats away and also leave it exposed to the air), but we do have white and whole wheat flour, so I did that.
Note that while I'm sure lots of you are experienced with sourdough starters and I welcome your comments and observations, I won't be following any suggestions until after the 2 weeks (or 14 feedings, whichever comes first) because I need to follow the protocol that the project calls for. They want data, even if it fails.
I don't have to report daily observations, but I figured I'd keep them for my own edification.
Original starter made with 2 Tb flour and 2 Tb dechlorinated water (water left out overnight) in Mason jars. Feedings are every 24 hours--discard 1 Tb of the starter, add 4 tsp flour and 1 Tb dechlorinated water, mix well and scrape the sides. Covered with a paper towel held on by a rubber band to keep out dirt, insects and cats while allowing microbes entry.
Tuesday, April 21
Made starters: King Arthur all-purpose white flour, Central Markup's whole wheat flour. Smelled of flour, obviously.
Wednesday, April 22
Not much visibly going on. Both mostly smell of flour, with a faint unpleasant odor.
Thursday, April 23
HOLY SHIT the whole wheat starter is twice the size of the white! Both have visible bubbles from the sides and bottom of the jars, although the whole wheat one has larger bubbles. Whole wheat smelled seriously rank, like that thing the emetophobes in my list hate (edit: active ingredient butyric acid!). White also smelled of the same odor, but not as strongly, and flour odor could still be smelled.
Friday, April 24
HOLY SHIT the white starter is twice the size of the whole wheat! This is where the action is happening, and it's full of bubbles. Its smell is also quite pungent, but not so much yesterday's smell and more on the order of stinky cheese, not good stinky cheese but bad stinky cheese. Smell much diminished after discarding and feeding. The discard was very stretchy and didn't want to leave the tablespoon. I had to shake it hard and bang it on the rim of the garbage can to get it off.
I also noticed a white liquid in the jar after I scooped out the discard. This might be the hooch the project website talks about. If it is, that's a sign that the starter is hungry and I should switch to twice-daily feeding. I'll see what it looks like tomorrow before changing anything up.
The whole wheat hasn't grown much, if any, although there are still bubbles in it that signal microbial action. Its smell is very faint, much like yesterday's odor, and the smell is almost gone after discarding and feeding. No loose liquid like the other.
edit: 2 hours later and the white starter is definitely more towards the “cheese” mark than the “butyric acid” mark. Yay!
I've also switched to bottled water because I don't like what could end up in the water left out overnight at my bedside, even though the project says you can use water left out overnight at your bedside. I didn't use the bottled stuff before because I forgot we had it!
-----
After yesterday's foul odor experience (and making![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
myrialux smell it, too!) I did some websearching about sourdough and found out that while not all starters smell nasty when starting out, some do. There's basically 3 waves of critters that grow in a new starter. The first wave is mostly coliform bacteria and once they make the environment too acidic, they die off. The second wave is another form of bacteria I don't remember, and they also eventually make the environment too acidic to survive and die off. What's left is mostly Lactobacillus bacteria and yeast that are tolerant of high acidity.
Some makers-of-starters artificially spike the acidity with lemon juice or something else at the beginning, which I assume skips the first two bacterial waves.
Anyway, I hope that's what's going on with the starters and that they'll eventually git gud (gaming reference there, probably not very amusing). If they don't, if they succumb to bacterial or mold infection it'll still be really interesting, just without the reward of sourdough bread and pancakes and pita, etc. at the end.
The most important question of all: WHAT ARE WE GOING TO NAME THE STARTERS IF THEY SURVIVE? Keeping in mind that I will never beat the one dude on Metafilter who named his Mikey D the Yeastie Boy.
Last week they sent out a new one, Wild Sourdough, where you make a sourdough starter following their instructions and after two weeks you take some measurements, make some observations, and report back to them.
They're interested in what different starters in different areas of the country (and maybe world?) do, as the strains of yeast in the air are different everywhere. They're also interested in data from starters made with different flours, and starters placed inside and outside the house. I chose not to put any outside the house because I don't want tomcats spraying the jars (there's no good place I can keep cats away and also leave it exposed to the air), but we do have white and whole wheat flour, so I did that.
Note that while I'm sure lots of you are experienced with sourdough starters and I welcome your comments and observations, I won't be following any suggestions until after the 2 weeks (or 14 feedings, whichever comes first) because I need to follow the protocol that the project calls for. They want data, even if it fails.
I don't have to report daily observations, but I figured I'd keep them for my own edification.
Original starter made with 2 Tb flour and 2 Tb dechlorinated water (water left out overnight) in Mason jars. Feedings are every 24 hours--discard 1 Tb of the starter, add 4 tsp flour and 1 Tb dechlorinated water, mix well and scrape the sides. Covered with a paper towel held on by a rubber band to keep out dirt, insects and cats while allowing microbes entry.
Tuesday, April 21
Made starters: King Arthur all-purpose white flour, Central Markup's whole wheat flour. Smelled of flour, obviously.
Wednesday, April 22
Not much visibly going on. Both mostly smell of flour, with a faint unpleasant odor.
Thursday, April 23
HOLY SHIT the whole wheat starter is twice the size of the white! Both have visible bubbles from the sides and bottom of the jars, although the whole wheat one has larger bubbles. Whole wheat smelled seriously rank, like that thing the emetophobes in my list hate (edit: active ingredient butyric acid!). White also smelled of the same odor, but not as strongly, and flour odor could still be smelled.
Friday, April 24
HOLY SHIT the white starter is twice the size of the whole wheat! This is where the action is happening, and it's full of bubbles. Its smell is also quite pungent, but not so much yesterday's smell and more on the order of stinky cheese, not good stinky cheese but bad stinky cheese. Smell much diminished after discarding and feeding. The discard was very stretchy and didn't want to leave the tablespoon. I had to shake it hard and bang it on the rim of the garbage can to get it off.
I also noticed a white liquid in the jar after I scooped out the discard. This might be the hooch the project website talks about. If it is, that's a sign that the starter is hungry and I should switch to twice-daily feeding. I'll see what it looks like tomorrow before changing anything up.
The whole wheat hasn't grown much, if any, although there are still bubbles in it that signal microbial action. Its smell is very faint, much like yesterday's odor, and the smell is almost gone after discarding and feeding. No loose liquid like the other.
edit: 2 hours later and the white starter is definitely more towards the “cheese” mark than the “butyric acid” mark. Yay!
I've also switched to bottled water because I don't like what could end up in the water left out overnight at my bedside, even though the project says you can use water left out overnight at your bedside. I didn't use the bottled stuff before because I forgot we had it!
-----
After yesterday's foul odor experience (and making
myrialux smell it, too!) I did some websearching about sourdough and found out that while not all starters smell nasty when starting out, some do. There's basically 3 waves of critters that grow in a new starter. The first wave is mostly coliform bacteria and once they make the environment too acidic, they die off. The second wave is another form of bacteria I don't remember, and they also eventually make the environment too acidic to survive and die off. What's left is mostly Lactobacillus bacteria and yeast that are tolerant of high acidity. Some makers-of-starters artificially spike the acidity with lemon juice or something else at the beginning, which I assume skips the first two bacterial waves.
Anyway, I hope that's what's going on with the starters and that they'll eventually git gud (gaming reference there, probably not very amusing). If they don't, if they succumb to bacterial or mold infection it'll still be really interesting, just without the reward of sourdough bread and pancakes and pita, etc. at the end.
The most important question of all: WHAT ARE WE GOING TO NAME THE STARTERS IF THEY SURVIVE? Keeping in mind that I will never beat the one dude on Metafilter who named his Mikey D the Yeastie Boy.