I make this recipe all the time. It can be a bit tricky. Please see the
rest of the article on salt rising bread. I still have some batches that
are complete failures for no particular reason, other than the bread god did
not smile on me.

email me if any questions.



the amounts of flour are vague in recipe, i have found it can vary a great
deal, depending on how much i add to starter to make a poolish. I have
found, temperature is critical in starter and the rising dough. If it
stinks, it is a good thing.



tim



SALT-RISING BREAD

* 3 medium potatoes

* 1 teaspoon salt

* 1 teaspoon sugar

* 3 tablespoons cornmeal

* 4 cups boiling water

* 2 cups lukewarm milk

* 1/8 teaspoon baking soda

* 1/8 teaspoon salt

* 2 tablespoons melted shortening

* 1 cup water

* Flour

Pare and slice potatoes and add 1 teaspoon salt, the sugar, cornmeal and
boiling water. Wrap bowl in heavy cloth. Cover and allow to stand in warm
place overnight.

In the morning, remove the potatoes. Add remaining ingredients with
sufficient flour to make a stiff dough. Knead until smooth and elastic. Form
into loaves. Let rise until double. Bake at 400 degrees for 45 minutes.

-- Mimi Cecil, East Lansing











Salt rising bread (SRB) suffers under a wealth of mis-information.

Wife and I have been making SRB for 40 years and more.

Mis-information steered us to many failing attempts to make SRB.

Early recipes included potatoes in one guise or another for failure

more often than not..



Sometime in the 1970s I came upon two relatively reliable recipes in

"Dr. Chase's Third, Last and Complete Receipt Book" published in 1901.

A "Mrs. Bruce" submitted my preferred recipe and describes the

starter (rising) as follows: "I set my rising about 5 o'clock in the

morning, and about 10 o'clock I add 1 table-spoonful of flour and

stir. If successful, your rising will be ready to make into loaves

about 2 o'clock in the afternoon. To set rising, take 1

table-spoonful of sifted corn meal, scald it by pouring over it 1 pt.

of boiling water and stir quickly. To this add cold water until just

hot enough not to scald. Then add a large tea-spoonful of coarse,

salt, a pinch of soda, a pinch of sugar, and flour enough to make a

stiff batter. Set your rising in a pitcher, a sugar bowl, or a new

tin dipper. Either must be sweet. Have ready a crock or pot with

warm water to come even with the rising and just hot enough not to

burn the finger. Set on the back of the stove or anywhere to keep an

even heat." Failure may occur in one out of six or seven attempts.



In discussing SRB with head of the baking department in the local

technical high school, I learned that the teaspoonful of salt would

kill or suppress any yeast in the mixture that was not destroyed by

the boiling water. Thus enlightened (Feb. 1981), I substituted

sulphur dioxide and hot tap-water for the salt and boiling water to

achieve unfailing results with the Chase recipe. Breakfast oatmeal,

in place of corn meal, yielded successful starters. I went on to

substitute barley, cracked wheat, and grits for stone ground corn in

the recipe. Regardless of grain type, starters were successful.

One-half of a standard Campden tablet supplied the sulphur dioxide.



About three years ago I found Susan Ray Brown's "Salt Rising Bread

Project" Web site and her invitation for comments. After describing

my 1980s activities to Susan, I went on to repeat the earlier

experiments and pushed experiments for more information. Susan had

copies of reports by an H.A. Kohman, published in 1912, which

declared Clostridium perfringens to be the bacteria leavening SRB.

Kohman devised the so-called SRB "yeast" that is distributed by King

Arthur and others.



A commercial food analysis laboratory confirmed instrument

overwhelming populations of C. perfringens in my starters. My

experiments moved to every grain I could obtain at the local natural

foods store; oat bran, steel cut oats, wheat germ, wheat bran, wheat

gluten, wheat flakes, spelt flakes, triticale, white and yellow

organic corn meal, processed white and yellow corn meal, kamut flour,

buckwheat flour, Robin Hood and King Arthur brands of white and whole

wheat flour all spent fermentation time as starter components. Bread

flours alone (no initiating grain) yield satisfactory starters in the

presence of sulphur dioxide, baking soda, and warm water. Cheddar

and blue cheeses initiate vigorous SRB starters. White oak and black

locust bark slivers are also effective initiators. Multiples of each

starter were made up in quart canning jars covered to exclude

contaminants.



DNA analyses of flour, corn meal, and cheddar cheese starters were

performed. The laboratory added warm distilled water to setups made

up of ½ cup Robin Hood flour, ½ teaspoon baking soda, ½ Campden

tablet, and 2 tablespoonsful corn meal, or ¼ cubic-inch of cheddar

cheese, or nothing for the flour-only setup. The DNA analysis,

performed a few hours after starters were incubated at 100F,

confirmed the cheese-based starter population to be Type A Clostridium

perfringens with the corn meal and flour starters having similar but

not identical populations.



Clostridium perfringens thrives at body temperature; after all, it is

the active agent in gas gangrene. My experiments confirmed that below

75 degrees Fahrenheit, the bacteria is inactive; above 125 degrees, it

is dead or constrained to inactive spores. There has never been a

report of human infection or illness initiated by SRB consumption.



A recipe better than Chase's was found in 2001. Success seems almost

certain even without the aid of sulphur dioxide. Practically, I have

had no failures, but have made no more than 15 or 20 starters and may

manage to fail in the future.



From "The American Heritage Cookbook", 1964 -

"2 cups milk

2 cups white corn meal

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt



"½ teaspoon baking soda

8-10 cups sifted all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons shortening



"Scald milk, remove from heat, and stir in corn meal, sugar, and salt

until smooth. Cover with a tea towel and set in a warm place

overnight. The following morning, add 1 cup warm water mixed with

baking soda and about 2½ cups flour (enough to make a rather stiff

batter). Set the bowl of batter in pan of warm water, cover, and let

stand until it foams up (this can take from 2 hours to half a day).

Try to keep the water at an even tempertute -not too hot, not too

cold. If it seems as though the batter is not rising, give it a stir

to help it along. Some people object to the odor during this perios,

but as Practical Housekeeping explained, this is 'the result of

acetous (or sour) fermentation, but the mor of that the more sure you

are of having sweet bread when baked.' When the batter has risen,

knead in shortening and more flour (it may take as many as 8 cups) to

make a stiff bread dough. Shape into two loaves, set in greased loaf

pans, and let rise until double in bulk. Bake in a preheated 350

degree oven for about 1 hour or until light brown in color."



Hot tap water and ¼ Campden tablet can be used in place of milk and

salt. Sugar, in my experiments, contributes nothing to a starter. It

does flavor the finished loaves, however.



The pH value of starters was measured as they developed. C.

perfringens generates acid as it proliferates, but seems to prefer a

low-acid environment. My well-water has a pH near 8.0; milk pH is

near 7.0 (neutral). Starters actively foam as pH drops from about 6.0

to 4.5. At 4.0, the starter is dead. Baking soda buffers the acid to

prolong C. perfringens action. If your water is soft (acid), use milk

in the starter or you might experiment with greater quantities of

soda.



Temperature is quite important. I have a large camper's ice box

fitted with a lamp and thermostat to hold temperature near 100

degrees. An alternative heated space can be assembled from an

expanded polystyrene food cooler. The $2.00 cooler I experimented

with has internal dimensions of 8 by 14 inches and height of 18

inches. To support the containers for starter and loaves, a small

saucepan was put in place with a shingle on it to serve as a shelf.

About a gallon of 125 degree tap water was then poured in with enough

in the saucepan to prevent floating. Fourteen hours later, a remote

reading thermometer registered 83 degrees in the box. Successful

American Heritage SRB passed through this jury-rigged contraption.





Salt rising bread can be no more temperamental or difficult to make

than conventional yeast breads. I will argue that it is easier than

sourdough breads since one starts with a fresh starter at each baking

and avoids the task of tending a culture from baking-to-baking.



Reinald