Date: Sat, 11 Apr 2009 06:41:14 GMT -------------- BEGIN bread-bakers.v109.n014 -------------- 001 - "Mary Fisher" Subject: RE: old starter Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 11:42:14 +0100 >From: Mike Avery >Subject: Re: old starter >Date: Sun, 29 Mar 2009 09:21:46 -0500 >Dr. Ed Wood wrote that he's never had a starter he couldn't >revive. A number of rec.food.sourdough folks have wondered if he's >always revived the same starter that he started with. Kinda like >Stephen King's "Pet Semetary". I don't know what that is, enlightenment, please? >The idea is.... Discard all but 1 cup of starter (Mary - it's not >good starter or good food at this point Well, Mike, I think you know in what esteem I hold you but that phrase is tantalising. Why is it not a good starter? And why is it not (potentially part of) good food? If it's not mouldy what's the problem? I've never had a starter grow mould, interestingly. >Add enough warm (not hot) water to the quart container to just about >fill it, stirring vigorously. Discard all but one cup of the diluted starter. But WHY? >Add 1 cup of unbleached all-purpose flour and 3/4 cup of >water. Stir, cover and wait 12 hours. > >Repeat the steps above until the starter takes off. In some cases, >Dr. Wood says, it can take 5 or 6 days. This is a thinner starter >than I usually use, which means that it will respond more quickly >than my usual starters would. It won't take any longer if you start with the complete starter though ... >I'm trying this technique on a starter that turned bad on me, and it >seems promising. Notes at http://www.sourdoughhome.com/breadblog.html I'll have a look but I can't think what would make a starter 'bad'. OK, I looked. As an aside, I spotted one or two typos, I'd be happy to proof your blog for you, you've given so much to so many including me. I know someone already does it but two heads are better than one and I've done it professionally (although nobody's perfect!) You said: Slashing can help prevent the loaves from tearing themselves apart. I started slashing a few years ago but occasionally I forget or events overtake the baking. When I don't slash and the loaf tears itself apart the result is better received than when it's more beautiful. The reason is that the tearing produces a very crisp and irregular crust at the bursting-out point and this crust is extremely popular with the family. They fight over it. So I'm thinking of deliberately not slashing. The main problem with that is that the crisp tear crust has very sharp point, the feature most enjoyed, and it can pierce freezer bags. Why can't Life be, if not perfect, then easy? :-) Mary --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.2 --------------- From: "Mary Fisher" Subject: RE: old starter Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 12:02:18 +0100 >From: "Dave Jimenez" >Subject: RE: old starter >Date: Mon, 30 Mar 2009 14:45:49 -0700 >Just wanted to share that as a result of trying to be the best dad, >husband, employee, and relative I let my sourdough sit in a sealed >mason jar in the fridge through 3 homes for a total of almost 10 >years. It never molded and I did manage to refresh it a few times >the 1st two of those 10 years. I may have refreshed it a couple of >times the next year or so, but I am positive that I never touched it >over the past 6 years other than to move it from one fridge to the next! I'm glad I'm not the only negligent starter parent :-) What grabbed me about this is that you say you keep your starter in a sealed jar. I've seen so much conflicting advice about how to store starters - and with sensible rationales for them - that I've tried three - in a sealed jar, in a bowl covered with cling film and in a bowl covered with a jug net - the kind with beads round the edge to hold down the net). The last is the best, I reckon. There's no danger of the jar bursting and there's no danger of the clingfilm loosening its grip and being disturbed. The flora in my fridge seem to be dealt with more than adequately by my starter, which never smells of acetone or any other unpleasantness. It always works and with a good flavour, what more could I want? Mary --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.3 --------------- From: Will Waller Subject: steam Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 08:06:45 -0500 I found a way to do steam that's cheap, dead-easy, and foolproof. 1) obtain very small, sauce pot with lid (I use a tiny Le Creuset I got at a thrift store) 2) remove the lid knob so there is a small hole, 1/4" is great... or drill a small hole in the lid 3) put an inch of water in it and heat on stove top WHILE you are pre-heating the baking oven 4) when the steam plume flows from the sauce pot's hole (on the stove top) it is ready for the baking oven 5) put the sauce pot on the floor of the oven, the floor energy will keep the steam plume strong or 6) preheat the oven with the steam pot and load bread when the plume is strong You have to fiddle with this technique, mostly to establish proper water level (too much steam for too long is bad), and get your timing so that the steam plume is coordinated with dough loading. This works well. It is fool proof. The steam plume is strong. Will --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.4 --------------- From: "Werner Gansz" Subject: RE: old starter Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 09:25:12 -0400 Mike Avery wrote about Ed Wood's starter reviving technique that takes 6 days; >folks have wondered if he's always revived the same starter that he >started with. Building a new fully usable starter from scratch takes about 4 or 5 days using wheat flour and about 3 or 4 days using rye flour. Since Ed's starter revival technique involves adding new flour, and it takes several refreshments to get the revived starter going, it is far more likely that the revived starter is actually a new sourdough. In Joe Ortiz's "The Village Baker" he doesn't save starters. Ortiz recommends starting from scratch each time you bake. That would seem to be good advice if you only bake sourdough occasionally. Refreshing a tired old starter will take several days at best, starting from scratch will only take a day or two more. I used to keep a starter, but I only baked sourdough occasionally. One day I forgot to set aside a piece of refreshed starter and ended up baking (and eating) my starter. When I built a new starter from scratch I found that the resulting bread tasted cleaner and fresher than the bread I made after refreshing tired starters. I think we all have a tendency to build the final dough too soon after we detect some life in the old starter and carry along a lot of spoiled flavors into the bread. Refreshing starters involves more than just getting the batter to bubble, it has to be continued until the starter smells "wheaty" and sweet, which may take day or two more. If you consider your nearly-dead starter to be just a piece of spoiled food rather than a family heirloom, it is emotionally much easier to abandon it and start over. Once you start over you will likely find that for occasional sourdough baking, starting over each time makes better bread and you don't throw anything away. I can't remember where I read these guidelines but they make sense to me: If you bake sourdough nearly every day, keep you starter as a batter and refresh it twice a day. If you bake sourdough once a week, keep you starter as a firm dough and refresh it for each bake. If you bake sourdough rarely, ie every few months, start from scratch. If you don't bake often you are not likely to keep refreshing your starter. Werner --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.5 --------------- From: "Werner Gansz" Subject: Crackling Crusts after Thawing Frozen Bread Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 09:57:59 -0400 A few months ago someone asked about how to prevent the crusts of breads that have been frozen and then thawed from cracking and crumbling. I answered with a few suggestions about slicing the loaves before freezing and possibly removing the loaves from the oven at 195 deg F to retain some moisture in the crumb which then might help keep the crust slightly moist after freezing. I have since found that there are two other ways that work but they involve altering the recipes. About a year ago I posted a pizza dough recipe that contains about 40% semolina and 60% all-purpose flour. I mix a batch size that makes two 11"X17" pizzas. Sometimes I only plan on one pizza using half the dough so I will shape the other half of the dough into either a baguette or into several rolls and bake them in the hot oven after the pizza is out. This bread has a softer, chewy, pull-apart crust which when frozen and thawed, gets firmer but does not break off. The coarser semolina seems to keep the crust from becoming brittle. You might start with 20% semolina, 80% all-purpose and see if it makes a difference. "Cooks Illustrated" recently published a ciabatta recipe which uses about 20% milk and 80% water. The milk supposedly weakens the gluten and keeps the holes in the crumb from getting too large or forming tunnels. But the milk also softens the crust slightly, just enough that when I froze one of the ciabatta loaves and thawed it a week later, the crust did not fall off. BTW, the "Cooks." recipe and its handling and shaping procedure works very well. Werner --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.6 --------------- From: "Gwen Brass" Subject: Re: another questions on 5 minute Date: Mon, 6 Apr 2009 07:14:31 -0700 >Now for my question -- I have made the 5-minute basic recipe a >number of times (and yes, Lynn, I keep the dough very wet; I don't >so much shape it as plop it). While the crust is fabulous, the >interior is gummy, even though (i) I am using all purpose flour >rather than bread flour, and (ii) I am cooking it to an interior >temperature of 205 F. Anybody have any suggestions? Try going to 210 F and see if it makes a difference. That's what I've always baked to. Sometimes I can pull it slightly sooner and it won't be gummy but often just that 5 degrees makes the difference for me. --------------- MESSAGE bread-bakers.v109.n014.7 --------------- From: Peter De Smidt Subject: Review of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day Date: Wed, 08 Apr 2009 16:28:58 -0700 Hi, I just posted a review of the book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois on my blog at . Comments welcome! --------------- END bread-bakers.v109.n014 --------------- Copyright (c) 1996-2009 Regina Dwork and Jeffrey Dwork All Rights Reserved