Starter Struggles
I can't figure out what my starter needs...
Stater will be 2 months old on the 20th.
So my starter has always been on the sluggish side since he was born. I started out with using KA bread flour. Even though he has shown activity by small bubbles everywhere, he would refuse to rise. No matter is fed a ratio of 1:1:1, 1:2:2, 1:3:3, he would always be very slow to rise (if at all. Maybe 1/2 an inch) and smell very vinegary by the next day. I switched to KA all purpose and that got rid of the pungent vinegar smell so now it has a lactic acid smell. I've tried feeding at 12 hour intervals but he was slow that he never peaked at 12 hours and then I would be getting rid of the yeast activity that Im trying to get started.
At 24 hours he would just be foamy and starving, but again no matter what 100% ratio I gave he would not peak until maybe 3 a.m so I would never catch it. I just recently did 85-90% hydration and that certainly changed things. Now instead. of rising 1/2 an inch at 24 hours he will rise almost halfway to double.
But he's extremely slow still. Not peaking til in the early morning. And if I try to use him for a recipe but the recipe calls for 100% ratio, he won't do anything. I'm just stuck what to do.
Right now he is -
90% hydration
AP flour
24 hour feedings starting in the morning.
Internal temp around 75-76 F with a thermometer (house is set to 72/73 with the a/c on and I keep him in my closet away from it)
Lives in a glass Ball jar.
In a tropical state if that makes any difference.
I don't know for sure what's going on for you. I can say it's quite different from the many times I've created a starter. So I'll make a few remarks that may or may not be helpful for you.
First, there's no need to wait for any kind of peak while the starter is getting going. Second, once you have got a working starter, the lower the hydration, the slower the development (i.e., how long it takes to rise). I use 100% hydration, myself.
Third, if you have a lot of chlorine in your water, that will inhibit growth. I use a water filtering pitcher and the water I use for making bread has usually been sitting in the pitcher for several days (for reasons of convenience, not anything fundamental).
Fourth, It's possible for a starter to get sick - I presume it catches some kind of pathogenic organism. I had that happen once. I finally threw out the starter and began again.
5th, I'd add some whole wheat or rye flour during feeding over several days. That usually perks up growth.
I'll describe how my feedings usually go. I discard much of the starter, and add 3 oz of water. I stir that up and add 3 oz of flour for 100% hydration. I stir that in. I keep the starter in a 1-qt deli container with its lid on. After 5 or 6 hours on the counter at room temperature (around 72 - 75 deg F), the starter will be airy and foamy, and will have risen most of the way up the container. This is with all-purpose flour, which is what I usually use. If you'd like it to continue development, it's very effective to stir it up and let it age for several more hours.
If I won't be using it to make dough at this point, I'll put it into the refrigerator. It will keep in good shape for a few days in the refrigerator before it needs to be used. Longer than that is OK but I usually need to feed it again before use. If the starter has been in too long it will get thin and maybe even soupy, and in that case it definitely needs to be refreshed before use.
Even if I use a lower hydration like say 67%, the starter will still rise to nearly fill the 1-qt container.
I'd bet on a problem with your water as the first thing to try changing. You could try bottled drinking water.
In your place, I would start a new batch of starter in a new or cleaned container, with the bottled drinking water. I'd use whole wheat flour until the starter was well established. Then I'd switch to unbleached all purpose flour, if only because it's easier to get.
A new starter should be usable in about a week, in my experience. During that time, you don't need to be concerned with hitting an exact feeding schedule. Just feed it every 12 - 24 hours at first, then once it shows signs of activity, more often until it's developing in a shorter time like 5 or 6 hours as I described above. The timing and amounts of feeding are not at all critical.
I have started new sourdough cultures keeping a lid on the container, and leaving the lid off. They all worked out about the same. Of course your experience may be different, but the point is not to worry about details like the exact time between feedings, exact hydration, etc. It will almost always work, or at least it has for me. If not, there's something else wrong like the water, or some pathogen in your kitchen, something like that.
One more point - you want to be buildlng up the concentration of yeast in the starter. Yeast reproduces in aerobic conditions - that is, when there is air (really oxygen) in the liquid. So it can help to stir the young starter vigorously from time to time to try to aerate the water, in order to favor the growth of new yeast cells. Using a high hydration like 100% makes this easier.
Good Luck!
I forgot to say in my post above that it can be helpful when you are starting to make a new starter to mildly acidify the liquid. Pineapple juice, just a small amount, seems to be perfect for this job. I'm sure lemon juice would be too.
The acidity promotes the initial yeast growth, and also helps prevent certain disease organisms (diseases for the yeast, that is) from gaining a foothold in the early days of getting the starter established and stable.
Hi!
So the reason I wait for park is because if I discard needle any of my sourdough starter hasn’t eaten all the food yet, I’m getting rid of the yeast that I’m working hard to get so then I have a lower yeast count. At least when it’s peaked or tells me that is done eating all the food I supplied.
And I do use bottled spring water. I don’t like my water on tap.
i haven’t considered my starter getting sick. What would the signs of that be?
"i haven’t considered my starter getting sick. What would the signs of that be?"
It only happened to me once, and that was a long time ago, so I may not remember accurately. I do know that Peter Reinhart reported that some of his recipe testers found while creating a new starter, found that it got sick, apparently from some known disease organism. Using acidity (pineapple juice) in the water the first few days of starter creation prevented that.
In my case, I noticed lack of growth and gas after feeding, and an unusual (and not pleasant) odor, as best as I can recall. I think I remember being able to nurse the starter back to health, but better would probably be to start building a new starter.
Naturally fermented pickles need to develop a certain level of acidity to keep them from spoiling. I imagine it's similar for a sourdough starter. Too much is bad for the yeast and desired bacteria, but too little could let undesired bacteria or mold start growing. Fortunately the way most of us work with sourdough this hardly ever happens, but it's possible.