Hi folks, I'm looking for a bit of advice with my new sourdough starter, it doesn't seem to be behaving very well.
We're now at Day 7, and it's not rising at all, and is super runny. It does smell good however, kind of fruity and vinegary, and there are bubbles on the surface, but that's it.
In the beginning, I somewhat misunderstood the instructions and didn't feed it often enough, only once every 24 hours for the first 3 days. After that, it started to develop a lot of hooch, and smelled awful, so I realised what I had done wrong. Since then I've been feeding it every 12 hours, and using the 1:1:1 ratio, and this is the stage I'm at.
Is there something I can do to get it to start rising again, and to thicken it? I'm not sure, but it doesn't seem ready for baking!
Thanks all.
(Photo attached).
I think you did wise for feeding only every 24 hours at the beginning and you should have kept that up till your starter had gotten stronger. The bad smell was a normal stage which your starter outgrows as it matures. But your starter also goes through a quiet stage which has been prolonged by feeding too often. What I would do is 24 hours after the last feed discard 1/4 then top back up with flour only till you get a thick paste and use some wholegrain too. Give it a good stir and don't feed again till it begins to show more signs of life. Till then keep it in a warm place and check up on it once a day. When it begins to show more signs of life then go back to a 1:1:1 feed every 24 hours. Once it begins to speed up then you should go for every 12 hours and increase the feed to 1:2:2. So you are feeding to the rhythm of your starter. As you slowly increase the feeds and feed amount you'll find it'll get stronger and once it bubbles up in cue it is ready.
Hi I thought that with a newer starter, almost as you're saying, feeding heavy dilutes the yeast? Shouldn't it be more like 2:1:1 (starter:flour:water)?
At the beginning smaller feeds of 1:1:1 (starter:water:flour) every 24 hours is fine. Some do less and some do a little more. But we certainly don't wish to overfeed and feed too often at this young stage. In fact often it all goes quiet days 3-5 and even skipping a feed or two is beneficial. Reason being is that the starter is becoming acidic, an environment which supports the yeasts and bacteria and overfeeding at this stage just slows things down. So it's not really about diluting the yeasts per se but rather it'll raise the PH level too much which is trying to lower. Once the yeasts and bacteria begin to take hold and grow in numbers then we switch (slowly) to bigger feeds, more often and allowing it to peak each time in order to build up the yeast and bacteria population. So it's more about feeding to the rhythm of the starter. Once a starter is fully viable then a little will inoculate a lot.