I tried to “wing it” on my sourdough starter
Hello everyone I need some help. I had some leftover dough in my fridge that had a pleasantly alcohol-y aroma to it. I didn’t think I would use it any time soon so I figured I would make it into some starter. I looked up some recipes but none of them included using some left over dough so I just tried to do my own thing. I added half a cup of water and flour to the mason jar I was using, threw in my dough and mixed it up. It was kind of lumpy but I figured it’d be fine. I’m on probably day 3 now. I did not add any more yeast than what was already in my dough. I’ve been feeding with about two table spoons of flour once daily but haven’t been dumping ( aka didn’t take out discard cause I keep forgetting) it has more of a kombucha scent now or like really really vinegary. It’s not super strong I have to actually put my nose to the jar to smell it. I’ve always found the scent of kombucha unpleasant so I’m not sure what to do now. I always get a nice deal of hooch at the top and I have not noticed any discoloration. I feed it once I notice the hooch because I know that is a sign it’s hungry, but I’m not sure exactly HOW MUCH or often I should be feeding and if dumping is a big deal. I really don’t want to throw it out but if I need to then I need to. Please advise everyone 🥲 I may have girl bossed a little too close to the sun…
Too much water. Don't add anything except flour. Get the consistency you like and keep going - minus refreshment. Might take a few but what can ya do (except the above). Enjoy!
I also want to note that it rises and bubbles well! I am just worried because the scent to me does not seem reminiscent of what is being described on the internet (yeasty and “pleasant”. It doesn’t smell bad persay- but it definitely smells fermented.
C above - give it time. Enjoy!
If it looks and acts like a normal starter, then I wouldn't worry much about the smell. The smell probably won't affect the taste of the bread. Over time if you keep a regular schedule of feeding the smell will probably slowly ebb away.
Was this leftover dough leavened with sourdough or commercial yeast originally?
Most people seem to maintain their starter at 100% hydration - equal weights of water and leave the refreshed starter at room temperature until it has risen noticeably - often doubled in volume, and then put the starter away into the refrigerator for some time - a few days at least - until it's gotten fairly inactive or turned thin. Then they take it out, discard or use the extra, and repeat the refresh cycle. Once the starter has developed well after a refresh, it can be used any time until time for the next refresh.
If you keep adding too much flour and water too often, you can end up diluting the yeast concentration in the starter more than the new yeast that has grown. In that case, the concentration of yeast in the starter will drop and drop over time until there's hardly enough left to raise a loaf of bread. So you don't want to keep feeding and feeding without giving the starter a chance to use all that new flour.
If you feed the starter and then leave it at room temperature, then in a time, maybe half a day, maybe a day depending on temperature, flour, hydration level, etc., a normal, active starter will need to be refreshed again. My own starter can't go a day and still be very active. Putting the starter into the refrigerator extends the length of time it can go before another refresh.
Hope something in all this is helpful!
TomP
Thank you Tom! I orginally used yeast for the dough I used to begin the starter. I asked for advice on tik tok and someone said I should throw it out bc of the “ bad bacteria” in the old dough. But it was only in my fridge for about 3 days. Also I forgot to ask I used almond milk in the original dough. Will that negatively affect the starter? Could that be why it smelled kombucha-y?
I suppose the milk could have an effect, depending on what organisms it brought with it. Unless it makes the new starter sick, its effect should fade away as you keep feeding the starter with flour and water. I wouldn't add any more milk to the starter, though. Most likely, the starter will become acidic enough to suppress undesirable organisms in the milk, but better to stick with water.
If the new starter seems to become less and less active, or never really perks up, you could try to add a little acid, for example lemon or pineapple juice. The extra acid might help to suppress competing organisms and establish a better equilibrium between yeast and desired bacteria.
"I asked for advice on tik tok and someone said I should throw it out bc of the “ bad bacteria” in the old dough".
And what do they think happens when one makes a starter, mixes flour and water then waits for it to activate? I can assure you it isn't all good bacteria at first. With feedings and time the good out does the bad and a starter is born.
That's where the pineapple juice or other acid comes in. It's supposed to lower the pH enough to suppress some of those organisms to skip past those first couple of days where undesirable or even toxic bacteria get to multiplying. I'm all in favor of that!
Not totally necessary but does save a lot of time. Just helped someone make their starter in under a week with wholegrain rye and pineapple juice.
https://forum.breadtopia.com/t/help-starter-not-responding/
Then again if everything is just right from flour to temperature to well timed feeds it's also possible with flour and water. I used an English heirloom grain called Maris Wigeons and made a starter within 3-4 days.
And the people making injera bread in the traditional way let the flour/water mixture ferment for several days before moving on to the next step. Still, good to keep things safer when practical.
Salt Rising Bread for one. I'm not sure about injera bread but a lot of these spontaneous fermented breads will have all sorts going on.
When I made starter from scratch it took a while and went through a really smelly period (lasted days iirc) that you either haven't reached yet or were really lucky to skip. Unless you're sure it's already pretty acidic, my suggestion is to add a little acid, then you might be able to skip through or shorten the smelly phase and speed up the process. But if you're really getting hooch this might be unnecessary, because that suggests the yeast has already supplanted the bacteria.
You just want mild acidity, people say pineapple juice is pretty good. If that's not easy to get, maybe just a 1/4 tsp or 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar?
Debra Wink wrote some great stuff about this, check it out here if you're up for reading more. Actually, in there she says vinegar inhibits yeast, so maybe that's a bad idea. Pineapple juice is supposed to be great though.
Also, how often to feed it is based on growth, which is based on acidity, yeast population, and temperature. If you're getting hooch it sounds like you've got good yeast and might want to feed it a little more often.
If you keep it in a warm place, you need to feed more often. If you keep it in a cool place, you can wait longer between feedings.
Dumping doesn't matter a lot. A good practice, but mostly about controlling volume and how much you need to feed it. If you have a large volume of starter, over time you'd use a lot of flour keeping it fed.