December 29, 2016 - 9:58pm
85% Hydration Starter?
Hi Everyone I have another question about starter hydration!
Can some one explain to me in painful detail how one would go about changing their 100% hydration starter (I feed my 50 grams of starter 50 grams water and 50 grams flour).
How much starter do I start with to convert my 100% hydration starter to 85% hydration. I understand that it's water divided by flour x 100.
If I want to build 150 grams of 85 % hydration starter how do I do that? Can someone give me the exact steps!
I am just not understanding how to take into account all 3 variables!
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For every 100g flour you'll need 85g flour for an 85% hydration starter.
To make this really simple all you'll need to do is the following...
Take 40g of your 100% hydration starter (which is 20g water + 20g flour)
and feed that with 65g water + 80g flour.
Allow that to mature and use 150g in your recipe.
You'll have 35g left over to use as you wish.
If you wish to build exactly 150g and have nothing left over then you'll have to scale down. That is a bit more challenging but easy enough. Do as follows...
185g starter @ 85% hydration is...
100g flour + 85g water
Now you want 150g starter. So 150/185 = 0.8108
Now multiply the flour and water by 0.8108 and you'll get 150g starter @ 85% hydration.
100 x 0.8108 = 81g flour
85 x 0.8108 = 69g water
Now all you need to do is take some of your 100% hydration starter (a bit less this time as you're building less but you're free to build as you wish so this is only a guide)....
30g starter @ 100% hydration = 15g flour + 15g water
Now feed your 30g starter with 54g water + 66g flour
= 150g starter @ 85% hydration.
1) Starter Amount ÷ 1.Hydration % = Total Flour
2) Starter Amount - Total Flour = Total Water
So . . .
1) 150g ÷ 1.85 = 81g Flour (rounded)
2) 150g - 81g = 69g Water
Therefore 150g starter @ 85% hydration = 81g flour and 69g water.
Edit: Just realized this doesn't actually answer your question. So let's continue . . .
50g of Seed Starter @ 100% Hydration = 25g water and 25g flour.
So . . .
81g flour - 25g flour = 56g flour
69g water - 25g water = 44g water
Therefore, 150g starter @ 85% Hydration = 50g seed starter (@ 100% Hydration) + 56g flour + 44g water
Cheers!
Trevor
for such a thorough explanation!
I once made a rye bread recipe that asked for a starter that was 166% hydration by feeding it one cup flour and water, there was a lot of starter at one point!
I need a liquidy starter again for a kvass recipe, can you help me convert my 100% hydration to a more liquidy (166%) starter.
How much of my own starter in grams do I need to convert it to a high hydration. I need it to be runny like in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngbb-ChO_FA&lc=z12mjpxbolejytpue23xuvph1lebsh4ko&feature=em-comments
Thank you both again so much and I am getting very close to understanding the whole hydration and starter business.
A while back I built a hydration calculator for folks here to use. Simply enter flour amount in grams and water amount in grams and it does the rest. If you know your starter is 100% and your using 100g, then enter 50 for flour and 50 for water in the 1st addition boxes respectively.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bUjHt7ETXzzk70n0ehKOawJMp5Wn0X_fkTgI_gjPFJs/edit?usp=sharing
Please don't click or erase anything (the formulas) in boxes H-3 or H-4, aas well as F-7 thru 17. Thanks, and enjoy.
Trevor, I know this is an old post, but it is still helpful.
In your edit, you chose 50 grams of seed starter because there are 3 parts to the 150 grams needed, right? 150 g needed divided by 3 parts = 50 g, so that's why you subtracted 25 g from the flour and 25 g from the water. Am I understanding correctly?
I don't bake often so I want to keep my starter in the refrigerator. I have read that a refrigerated 50% hydration starter is easier to keep than a 100% refrigerated starter. So, I think I want only 50 grams total of 50% hydration starter. I calculated the following...I hope it is right.
50 g ÷ by 150% = 33 g flour. 50g total - 33g flour = 17 g water. Then to change the 50 g seed starter @ 100% hydration to 50% hydration, I would divide the 50 g total seed starter by 3 = 16.7 g (round down to 16 g to get rid of decimals). 16 g ÷ 2 = 8 g flour and 8 g water. Then I would subtract 8 g from the 33g flour and 8 g from the 17 g water. Am I right so far?
To make my new 50 g of 50% hydration starter, I would add 16 g of my 100% hydration refrigerated starter, 25 g flour, and 9 g water. Did I get the calculations correct? It would now be about 51.5% hydration (>51.51%)? Total flour of 33 g and total water of 17 g which equals 50 grams of new starter.
Once at 50% hydration, I want to refrigerate it. Then, when it is time to feed the 16g of refrigerated 50% starter, I feed it 2 parts (33g) flour and 1 part (17g) water? Do you suggest a different amount? Will this keep it at about 50%?
Should I keep 16g of starter and discard any extra when I feed it? I want to feed it as little as possible, but I am not sure when. Once a month, every two weeks, weekly...
24 hours before I want to use the starter for baking, I need to remove 16 g of 50% hydration starter and change it to 100% hydration. Would I feed it with 1 part flour and 2 parts water? Here is where I got lost. How many grams of that 16g starter is flour and how much is water? Then I would need to build it up to the amount the recipe calls for...maybe 2 or 3 feedings because it had been refrigerated?
What if I wanted to change the 50% hydrated refrigerated starter to 125% hydrated starter? If I removed 16 g of 50% hydrated refrigerated starter, how many grams of flour and water would I use to change it to 125%?
I have spent over 2 hours typing and changing my numbers on this post. I hope I have something calculated correctly..... I know the flour is considered 100% so I think the water would be 25% more than the flour....
Oh, I have a headache! I hope I don't give anyone else one while reading this post. If you have the time, I would very much appreciate it if you would fix my calculations. Thank you.