December 19, 2020 - 1:51pm
How can I fix too-sour starter?
The baker who runs “The Bread Code” YouTube channel suggested to taste your starter to see if it is sour. YIKES - mine is VERY sour and may account for ny recent failures. This starter is a “San Francisco” breed I bought last year and have been keeping it ever since. Currently I feed it 50-50-50. The flour is a mix of equal AP & WW. It will double in about 4 hrs.
It seems like a very robust starter... how can I tone down the sourness? BTW - I would like to get a “snappy” bread so I hope I don’t have loose too much.
Alan R.
Share
And getting an idea of how your final loaf will turn out is like tasting just the salt to get an idea how a dish will turn out. I hope my bread tastes nothing like neat starter. Starter itself will always taste like sour sticks x 1000.
How your final loaf turns out will depend not only on how you maintain a starter but also how it's used inside the final dough and levain (if incorporating one). It's the whole picture.
Look up on how to make a young sweet levain and recipes which incorporate one and your bread will come out milder. You can also use durum flour in your starter and main dough which discourages tang.
If you wanted to greatly reduce the acids in your starter, you could reduce the hydration to 60-65% and increase the feed ratio (a greater percentage of flour). Ferment at some temperature between 78-82F and refresh at peak or no longer than just after in begins to recede. A few feeds like this should have you where you want to be.
Acid evaluation for starters -
Smell will give you some indication but taste is much better.
Take a small piece of the starter and place it on the side of your tongue. You’ll know if it is very acidic. Spit it out afterwards.
Why not ask the youtube guy. He's probably got a video on it. Enjoy!
I think the fellow may be overwhelmed with comments - nothing heard
Alan Abe and Dan have certainly made excellent suggestions. A couple of other suggestions would be.
Greatly reduce the seed used to feed your starter. The more of the starter which you find very acidic you use in the next feed the greater the amount of acid you’re carrying over and over time it can build. You’re currently doing 1:1:1 feeds. How about 1:6:6 instead, you’ll have less acid carried over from the current starter to the newly fed one.
Switching to the lowest ash content flour, which would be a white flour also leads to less acidity in general compared with a high ash flour such as whole rye.
Feed the starter more often and with just AP.
You should realize that although a bread dough is risen with a sourdough culture, the bread will be baked before all the food for the yeast and bacteria metabolism is exhausted and their by-products have built to the point of tasting very sour. The bread will not tastes as sour as a hungry starter.
Oh, and don't forget to spit out the starter after tasting it.
Sourness in the bread is not so much based on the sourness of the starter.
See:
https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/62064/want-more-sour
https://truesourdough.com/best-temperature-for-proofing-sourdough-full-guide-how-to/
https://truesourdough.com/18-ways-to-make-sourdough-bread-more-or-less-sour/
So much conflicting info in these links.
Thanks for the great 'tech' info. I'm beginning to think that a lot of my woes come from not letting the dough ferment long enough - rushing the bake. :-(
Alan, if your concern remains less sour, allowing the dough to ferment longer is not your answer. The longer a starter, levain, or dough ferments (after maturity) the more acidic it gets.
Guess I misspoke. I'm looking for MORE flavor and some sourdough 'sour' :-)
https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/san-francisco-style-sourdough-bread/
Abe - thanks for the link - have saved it.
Alan, there are a number of things can be done to reduce the acids in your starter
Comment about #2 -
If your starter is super acidic, and considering the fact that you mentioned that is was very active and growing fast, you may want to feed 6:24:30. (1:4:5)
As far as increased flavor -
Yes, longer fermentation will increase the flavor. But be careful to not over-ferment any stage of your dough. Over-fermentation is how sour (acids) are produced.
As I write the above a thought comes to mind. You said you wanted to increase the flavor and at the same time reduce the sour. Study up on acetic and lactic acid flavors. I think the flavor profile you are describing is a well fermented dough that exhibits lactic acids over acetic acid. Acetic acid is vinegar, lactic acid is smooth like yogurt. My best description of lactic and acetic acids is acetic = sharp cheddar cheese and lactic = mild cheddar. Each of these two distinct acids favor different environments. The mild lactic acids like wet doughs (100% hydration) and warm temps. Acetic acids like drier doughs and colder temps.
I hope this is helpful.
Danny