Bread - essential man skill.

[Mike Islander]

Takes a bit of practice to handle the dough and time the proofing before baking. But it sure is worth it. My wife hates sourdough, or thought she did. She loves fresh made with our natural starter.

 

[brca005]

Sourdough starter experts:

I’m trying to make my first ever sourdough starter. I’m a little confused as to when the starter is ready to make bread. Is it just based off of rise, or time, or both?

I'm far from an expert on this, but based on my experience, it's both.

Yes, you can get rise a couple days after you start it, but your starter won't be strong enough and will have very dense/spongy bread, that's why they say it takes 7+ days to make a starter because it needs to be strong enough to give rise to the bread. Giving it the true sourdough look and taste. It took me a while (with a help from a buddy) to figure this out.

Also, don't overthink it, keep it simple, don't go into the weeds with it. That's what I've learned for me, is the simpler I keep it and the less I care, the better it all turns out. Which is a blessing and curse, because I keep making loaves for friends and they keep telling me how much they like and want more. I'm going to start making it a side hustle soon.

 

[brca005]

Here’s a couple I’ve made this week:

 

[AZ Gator]

I'm far from an expert on this, but based on my experience, it's both.

Yes, you can get rise a couple days after you start it, but your starter won't be strong enough and will have very dense/spongy bread, that's why they say it takes 7+ days to make a starter because it needs to be strong enough to give rise to the bread. Giving it the true sourdough look and taste. It took me a while (with a help from a buddy) to figure this out.

Also, don't overthink it, keep it simple, don't go into the weeds with it. That's what I've learned for me, is the simpler I keep it and the less I care, the better it all turns out. Which is a blessing and curse, because I keep making loaves for friends and they keep telling me how much they like and want more. I'm going to start making it a side hustle soon.

Thanks for the reply. Once I get to that two week threshold, should I see the starter rising to about 2x or more of its size at feeding?

How detrimental is missing a feeding at 24 hrs and instead getting it done at about 36 hours? My first starter was going great until about day 5 when I forgot about it in the evening and didn’t feed it until morning. I kept going another week with it but it never regained its rise. It never turned color or developed a putrid smell or otherwise seemed dead, it would just rise about 10% instead of the previous 100% rise. I decided to abandon it and start over. Similarly, my new batch was already doubling on day 3, then I forgot about it for the extra 12 hours. The two days since then it has risen less and less each day. I’m not sure what to make of it.

 

[brca005]

Thanks for the reply. Once I get to that two week threshold, should I see the starter rising to about 2x or more of its size at feeding?

How detrimental is missing a feeding at 24 hrs and instead getting it done at about 36 hours? My first starter was going great until about day 5 when I forgot about it in the evening and didn’t feed it until morning. I kept going another week with it but it never regained its rise. It never turned color or developed a putrid smell or otherwise seemed dead, it would just rise about 10% instead of the previous 100% rise. I decided to abandon it and start over. Similarly, my new batch was already doubling on day 3, then I forgot about it for the extra 12 hours. The two days since then it has risen less and less each day. I’m not sure what to make of it.

Yes, you should see it at least double in size

If it was my starter, I'd actually feed it more often, potentially in the 15-18 hour mark, I think of my starter as a "living" thing and it needs to be fed like the rest of things on this rock. So in turn, the more you feed it, the happier it will be, just like the rest of us when we get to eat more often.

Also, don't be afraid to put it in the fridge after you get your starter going and make bread with it. Mine lives in the fridge until I need to make bread again, I'll usually take it out a day or two out before I'll make the next loaf, to give it time to warm back up and rejuvenate. Mind you, I put it in the fridge with whatever is left in the jar after I'm done adding to the dough, so there isn't a ton of starter in the jar, but when I pull it out of the fridge, I'll feed it and let it do it's thing. I know people who will have their starters in the fridge for weeks between feedings and their starters are still good, they'll get hooch on the top, but just dump it out, discard, feed and off the starter goes again.

A trick that has worked for me, when I need my starter to rise faster and also when I needed to give it a boost when it wasn't rising as much is I would put around 1 TBSP of honey in it. My simple brain understands it as, you're helping the starter skip a step of creating it's own sugar (of sorts) and just giving it straight so it doesn't have to work for it. For the times I've done that and then made a loaf with added honey in the starter, I never did taste a hint of honey, if that would be a concern. I'm also one who puts honey on A LOT of things.

 

[Buckhunter55]

After you’ve been discarding and feeding it should double or triple in size in six to eight hours and it will be bubbly.

 

[AZ Gator]

Yes, you should see it at least double in size

If it was my starter, I'd actually feed it more often, potentially in the 15-18 hour mark, I think of my starter as a "living" thing and it needs to be fed like the rest of things on this rock. So in turn, the more you feed it, the happier it will be, just like the rest of us when we get to eat more often.

Also, don't be afraid to put it in the fridge after you get your starter going and make bread with it. Mine lives in the fridge until I need to make bread again, I'll usually take it out a day or two out before I'll make the next loaf, to give it time to warm back up and rejuvenate. Mind you, I put it in the fridge with whatever is left in the jar after I'm done adding to the dough, so there isn't a ton of starter in the jar, but when I pull it out of the fridge, I'll feed it and let it do it's thing. I know people who will have their starters in the fridge for weeks between feedings and their starters are still good, they'll get hooch on the top, but just dump it out, discard, feed and off the starter goes again.

A trick that has worked for me, when I need my starter to rise faster and also when I needed to give it a boost when it wasn't rising as much is I would put around 1 TBSP of honey in it. My simple brain understands it as, you're helping the starter skip a step of creating it's own sugar (of sorts) and just giving it straight so it doesn't have to work for it. For the times I've done that and then made a loaf with added honey in the starter, I never did taste a hint of honey, if that would be a concern. I'm also one who puts honey on A LOT of things.

Awesome. Thanks for the help!

 

[beerbucksducks]

The biggest things that helped me were weighing ingredients, messing with hydration and ignoring time frames in “recipes”. Everyone’s starter, flour, water and room temperature are different. I spent a ton of time following recipes and timelines with poor results. Once I started “eyeballing” my initial rise and refrigerating my second rise, my bread got way better.


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[AZ Gator]

The biggest things that helped me were weighing ingredients, messing with hydration and ignoring time frames in “recipes”. Everyone’s starter, flour, water and room temperature are different. I spent a ton of time following recipes and timelines with poor results. Once I started “eyeballing” my initial rise and refrigerating my second rise, my bread got way better.


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Thanks. I may need to do just that.

Can you help me understand what you mean by initial rise and second rise?

 

[beerbucksducks]

Thanks. I may need to do just that.

Can you help me understand what you mean by initial rise and second rise?

After you mix everything and do 4 rounds of stretch/folds, you’ll let the dough rise until it’s bubbly and jiggly. That’s the first rise. Then you shape your loaf and put it in a proper size/shaped container or loaf pan for the second rise. 18-48 hours in the fridge. Then you bake it


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[h2so4]

I once had to show @Salmon River Solutions and @Unknown Suppressors how to remove a loaf of bread from a bread maker. It was pretty entertaining.

 

[brca005]

The biggest things that helped me were weighing ingredients, messing with hydration and ignoring time frames in “recipes”. Everyone’s starter, flour, water and room temperature are different. I spent a ton of time following recipes and timelines with poor results. Once I started “eyeballing” my initial rise and refrigerating my second rise, my bread got way better.


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After you mix everything and do 4 rounds of stretch/folds, you’ll let the dough rise until it’s bubbly and jiggly. That’s the first rise. Then you shape your loaf and put it in a proper size/shaped container or loaf pan for the second rise. 18-48 hours in the fridge. Then you bake it


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Lots of truth here! I spent a bunch of time watching YouTube and once I stopped watching YouTube and keeping things simple my bread got a lot better.

Unlike most on here (and the rest of the internet), I can't get a loaf to turn out when I refrigerate it, so I don't. I leave it on the counter for 8-10 hours after doing 3 rounds of stretch and folds, then I shape it, let it sit for 2 hours in the baten basket with a cover and then bake it. I also look at it, in ancient times there wasn't any fridges, so when they were making bread they didn't proof it in the fridge, they mixed the dough, let it sit, shaped it and baked it, most likely same day.

Like most things in life, there's a zillion ways to do things and making sourdough is one of them, make it your own, that's the fun of it.

 

[wyosam]

Have any of you sourdough masters made sourdough bagels, true boil then bake bagels?

A local bakery used to make them and they are incredible

I used to make them a lot- took quite a bit of playing with to get proofing time and moisture dialed to get a good crumb, but man were they good. My starter died when we moved to AK, I should probably pick it back up.


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