Hi everyone - total sourdough newbie here! I got a starter from a neighbor about 2 weeks ago and tried to get it ready for baking after a day or so in the fridge. I followed her advice by using King Arthur's suggested fridge-revival technique here: https://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/feeding-and-maintaining-your-sourdough-starter-recipe
It never rose much, but it did look bubbly and active, especially after the first feed. After the second feed it passed the float test, but we decided it didn't make sense to bake a loaf then because Passover was the next day, so we put it back in the fridge for a week.
I took the starter out again on Thursday and tried to follow Claire Saffitz's NYTimes recipe for sourdough (which is less flour-intensive) but halved (so 20g starter, 50g water, 50g flour.) For our first feed we did 25g wheat flour and 25g white flour to try to energize the starter. Nothing much happened. 12 hours later we fed again (down to 20g of starter and same proportions, back to all white flour.) Still nothing. We did 2 more rounds of feeding and nothing has happened. There are a few bubbles but it's failed the float test every time and it's never really grown. Now I'm just letting it sit and seeing what happens.
I'm wondering what we did wrong, or if anyone has any advice? It's a bit chilly in our kitchen but I've also tried having it in the oven with the light on (around 75 degrees) for feeds too and that didn't do anything. We've never been able to get it as active as it was that first time again, and even that wasn't so active. But I know our neighbor made beautiful bread with it. Have we diluted it by feeding it when it's not active? Any tips are welcome. Thank you!
Honestly rather than bombard you with advice at this stage (and there is so much available, that it’s a bit like trying to drink from a fire hose), I’d just strongly suggest that you call out to your neighbour and ask for some DETAILED instructions of how he or she (a) maintains this starter, and (b) uses it to make bread. Just follow everything to the letter, including using the exact same type of flour - that’s important...
I know it might sound like this is going crying for help when you’d prefer to be working out your own way to do it - but it will save you SO much time and heartache. And once you’ve got it nailed and you how things are meant to look, feel and smell, then you can start adapting the approach to your own preferences:-)
I will reach out to her today :) appreciate it!
Ask for advice from your neighbor, and also give the starter time. Sometimes they just take longer to wake up. It will eventually wake up though. I revived one once that had been in my fridge long forgotten for months.
Thank you! Just a clarification: by "give it time", do you mean keep feeding as I have been? Or should I let the current batch sit for a while and see if it grows? Thank you again.
OK it's probably best not to give a SD culture more flour and water until it's used up what it already has; otherwise you're effectively diluting it - the risk is that by doing so, you reducing the acidity to the point where the SD microbes are not so vigorous and you might get competition from other beasties.
That said, what you did originally sounds alright - so I'm surprised that you didn't see much activity within (if I recall) 12h (!). Could it be that your water is very heavily chlorinated or otherwise treated?
If you still have some of the original starter left (even a teaspoon will do) just add a spoonful of it to 5x the weight of flour and 5x the weight of water. Stir that up and leave it at room temperature... if you don't see bubbles within 5hrs then something is definitely wrong!
but I've been using bottled water to try to avoid this! So I don't think chlorine could be the problem.
Fed 12 hours ago - both 1) the one I'd been feeding since Thursday and 2) one started from the fridge, though sadly I'd been putting all my saved discard in the same container (oops) so I don't have any pure original starter left. Per my neighbor's advice I did 30g starter / 40g flour / 30g water for each. Here's what happened. (Both failed the float test.)
This is #1 - I left it 24 hours without feeding beforehand just to see if that helped, and after those 24 hours it seemed to be more liquid with lots of small bubbles. I was hopeful because it looked better around the sides and had maybe grown a little, though not many surface bubbles.
This is #2, which looks pretty similar to me.
Thoughts? Should I feed again?
Not exactly frothing is it - but you do have bubbles, so something is going on :) keep discarding and feeding at room temp and lets see what happens in a few days time. Did you try adding a bit of whole wheat?
Just fed each one again at the same proportions :) if there's a similar minimal level of activity after 12 hours, should I let it go 24 before feeding, you think? Thank you again for your help and encouragement
If there is little activity, just stir it once or twice a day and don't feed it until it shows a fair amount of bubbles. Also be careful with lids, If a starter really gets active, they can explode. (better to leave loosely covered, then it will just ooze out the sides ;-)
wanted to let you know that things went better today! thanks again for all your help