Here is the documentation of Nathan's sourdough baking experience Passionate pursuit!
I recently tried baking my first sourdough during quarantine from my own starter -- it actually turned out well. I recently had to move across the country to go back to school and left my starter at home. This seeks to document my experiments with sourdough as I learn more and more!
I'm lucky enough to go to a school that helps fun "passionate pursuits" by students. This means that I got $130 to invest in all the thigns I would need for bread baking. I purchased ~20lbs of flour, salt, seeds, canning jars, parchement paper, and a lodge combo cooker! INSERT PIC HERE
The main goal of this passionate pursuit is to make an actual SOUR loaf. My previous loaves only had a tinge of sourdough, they were still super yummy! There is much talk of different things you can do to make things more sour, I plan to document what I do to try and get more sour! THis involves several different starters (3!?) I also want to get better at cutting and decorating bread and making cool patterns!
Building starter is simple! It just requires time, flour, water, and some patience. I decided to start 3 starters -- one that was almost all wheat flour, one that used Bob's Red Mill Bread Flour, and one using some generic unlbeached flour. I anticpate that these two starters will be merged but I wanted to see if the bobs flour yields nicer bread.
INSERT STARTER PHOTOS
DAY2 photos
As you can see I've got some fermentation happening in all of the containers! They also all smell like sourdough!
I've kept my dorm room ~75C to help fermentation happen quicker. Usually it takes 5-8 days to have a starter that is strong enough to bake bread! sd
- Plastic spoons aren't strong enough to stir multiple starters
- Leaving starter open can yield a dry crusty layer on top of starter