Posted on 05/02/2010 8:50:34 PM PDT by Steelfish
MAY 3, 2010 Was That Blob in Your Kitchen Born in the Gold Rush? Bakers Obsess Over Pedigree of Yeasty 'Starters'; Some End Badly
By KATY MCLAUGHLIN
Marni Witkin normally feeds Happy twice a day. Once, she forgot to feed him for three straight days, and he looked distressed. "I'm not necessarily a good pet owner," says Ms. Witkin, a Los Angeles Web site editor. After a few extra feedings, Happy was back to his bubbly old self.
Vintage sourdough starter -- a bubbly mix of flour, yeast and bacteria used to make crusty loaves of bread -- is all the rage in culinary circles. . WSJ's food writer Katy McLaughlin ordered one online and tried it out. Happy is no ordinary pet. He is a sourdough "starter"—a blob of wet flour, colonized by yeast and bacteria—that lives on her kitchen counter. Home bakers increasingly are using starters, which bring more nuance and flavor to bread than store-bought packages of yeast. Each time bakers add some starter to a batch of bread, they leave some behind. It grows on a diet of flour and water.
The recession and high unemployment have left people with less money for restaurant food but more time for ambitious baking recipes. Baking-supply company King Arthur Flour saw an 11% spike in flour sales in its last fiscal year. The Fresh Loaf, a baking website that discusses sourdough, now attracts 1.25 million page views a month, more than double the number two years ago.
It takes dedication to keep the burbling goo healthy, and home bakers can develop a fierce attachment to their starters. Many give them pet names, keep them growing for decades and worry about their health.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
My friend’s pet was named “Igor”!
Please have mercy, no Helen Thomas pictures!
Somehow I don’t think my wife would appreciate growing a blob in the kitchen. Hard enough time getting her to let me grow yeast for CO2 for my planted aquarium and she can’t see that contraption.
I have had a sourdough starter for years and used it a lot. I love being able to bake without having to use any yeast at all. It is a much different taste than what commercial yeast has.
No kidding, we have a capped guinea hen here loose in the neighborhood, that we are trying to find the owner to come and get it. In the meantime, we had to decide what to call the damned thing.
Remember the wedding scene in “Goodfellas”?? Where Paulie is introducing the Karen the bride to the family, and he tells her all the boys are named Paul, and all of the girls are named Marie??
What better name for a Guinea Hen than “Marie”...
I keep my starter in the fridge. It remains dormant until I take it out and refeed it. But it takes a couple of days to fully rekindle the thing when I need it — using a custom-built proofing box to keep its temperature at a constant 85 degrees F.
If you elect to go this route, you can order starter cultures (dried) from Italy OR San Francisco from sources online. Make mine Italian — for a more refined taste. Just be prepared for VERY slow rise times. Takes me a day or more for each baking session, AFTER the culture has been restarted.
Interesting article. Thanks.
A friend of mine had a sourdough starter pile and made sourdough pancakes from it. They were the best pancakes I have ever had by far. I didn’t think pancakes could be that good. If anyone likes pancakes it’s worth the effort.
Looked and found this reference for starter including refrigerating:
http://whatscookingamerica.net/Bread/SourdoughStarter.htm
Very welcome. You can tell I’m a sourdough fan!
I do the same with my soughdough starter but since I have a Zojurushi bread machine that has the abilty for me to profram cycles I have a proofing cycle set.What I do is pull the starter out, feed it, let it get to room temp then measure out what I need for the bread I’m making,load it into the machine and let it go on a 13 hour rise cycle. I usually let it go overnight so in the morning I just add the rest of the ingredients and voila perfect bread. I made my own starter years ago and it is very tasty. Start to finish takes me about 15 hours.
profram=program
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