Hey,
I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more sour.
How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor?

Kevin

At 05:48 PM 4/1/2004, you wrote:
>Hey,
> I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
> noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more
> sour.
> How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor?
>
>Kevin

tough question with the amount of information given. Here a couple of
blanks to fill in:

- starter
a - what kind
b - time before making dough: how long grown/how long since it was grown
from scratch (if so)
c - temperature range during growth
d - number of refreshments, ratio of increase of new flour to total flour
e - hydration
....

- dough
a - what kind of target dough
b - flour
c - hydration
d - starter amount
e - temperature
f - times (kneading, rising...)
....

without some of the information given, it's just maybe: "longer, warmer"

The question you asked is like: I have a garden and the plants growing from
the seeds I sowed are just not looking right, what shall I change?

Samartha


>_______________________________________________
>Rec.food.sourdough mailing list

>http://www.mountainbitwarrior.com/ma...food.sourdough

===


remove "-nospam" when replying, and it's in my email address

In
news:mailman.1080885243.3145.rec.food.sourdough@ww w.mountainbitwarrior.co=
m...
Samartha sez to Kevin:

> Here a couple of blanks to fill in:

> [ ... ]

Whoops, that was more than a couple!

Why not just write a concise general instruction on how to=20
make the bread more sour?

Put it here so it can be seen by all, and found at the Google
archive, and the archive of your choice?

> The question you asked is like: I have a garden and the=20
> plants growing from the seeds I sowed are just not looking=20
> right, what shall I change?

I am glad that came up. They are washing down to the pond=20
in torrents of run-off from the rain.

What is the answer?

--=20
Dick Adams
<firstname> dot <lastname>at bigfoot dot com

On 4/2/04 8:15 AM, "Dick Adams" > wrote:

> In
> news:mailman.1080885243.3145.rec.food.sourdough@ww w.mountainbitwarrior.com...
> Samartha sez to Kevin:
>
>> Here a couple of blanks to fill in:
>
>> [ ... ]
>
> Whoops, that was more than a couple!
>
> Why not just write a concise general instruction on how to
> make the bread more sour?
>
> Put it here so it can be seen by all, and found at the Google
> archive, and the archive of your choice?
>
>> The question you asked is like: I have a garden and the
>> plants growing from the seeds I sowed are just not looking
>> right, what shall I change?
>
> I am glad that came up. They are washing down to the pond
> in torrents of run-off from the rain.
>
> What is the answer?

I think the beauty of working with "sourdough" starters is there really is
no single answer to this question. There are many possibilities. Let's name
a few we might disagree on:

1) The easiest... Go to Ed Wood's web site and buy his most sour culture.
2) Migrate your starter's refreshments from white or wheat flours to rye.
3) Choose to build from retained, mature dough rather than sponge.
4) Use your sense of smell to evaluate the fermentation process. Knowing
when a dough is ripe is essential practice.
5) Work on a very basic bread (a la Laurel Robertson's Desem example) until
you have nailed down the idiosyncrasies of your grain supply, water,
micro-climate (proofing box, refrigerator, basement, etc...), oven, and
starter behavior.
6) Stay away from bananas, figs, apricots and other wonderful
what-have-you's unless you've got Betty Crocker's private phone number. My
personal feeling is these amendments are better on top of bread rather than
in it.
7) Be sure your "benchmark" bread isn't a highly engineered, atypical
example of the naturally leavened world.

Will

Kevin Breit > wrote:

> I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
> noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more sour.
> How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor?

One thing I noticed is that the type of starter makes a critical difference.
Last year I had a starter which was very active and extremely sour, you
could smell it readily and it bubbled vigerously easily. However a room mate
killed it accidently when I was out for the weekend. The starter that I am
using now has a better rise, but it not nearly as sour. I have tried lots of
things to sour it, like letting it rise and fall multiple times, very long
rises including the fridge, but it will not come close to what I had before.
So I am going to try to get another wild starter shortly.

--
Cliff Stamp
http://www.physics.mun.ca/~sstamp/

The one unforgivable sin, the offence against one's own integrity,
is to accept anything at all simply on authority -- Maureen Johnson Long

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. -- Publilius Syrus

"williamwaller" > wrote in message =
news:mailman.8.1080920073.229.rec.food.sourdough@m ail.otherwhen.com...

> I think the beauty of working with "sourdough" starters is there =
really is
> no single answer to this question.

But some answers are better than others.

> 1) The easiest... Go to Ed Wood's web site and buy his most sour =
culture.
> 2) Migrate your starter's refreshments from white or wheat flours to =
rye.
> 3) Choose to build from retained, mature dough rather than sponge.
> 4) Use your sense of smell to evaluate the fermentation process. =
Knowing
> when a dough is ripe is essential practice.

"ww" may still be having some trouble with his sourdough. (He seems to =
have
been sucked in by the 'sour starter --> sour bread' myth.)

> 5) Work on a very basic bread (a la Laurel Robertson's Desem example) =
until
> you have nailed down the idiosyncrasies of your grain supply, water,
> micro-climate (proofing box, refrigerator, basement, etc...), oven, =
and
> starter behavior.

Won't hurt, but can be omitted.

6) Stay away from bananas, figs, apricots and other wonderful
what-have-you's unless you've got Betty Crocker's private phone number. =
My
personal feeling is these amendments are better on top of bread rather =
than
in it.

Good!=20
=20
7) Be sure your "benchmark" bread isn't a highly engineered, atypical
example of the naturally leavened world.

What is a "highly engineered, atypical example of the naturally leavened
world?

--=20
Dick Adams
<firstname> dot <lastname>at bigfoot dot com

P.S. What's your bread look like, ww?


=20

On 4/2/04 1:38 PM, "Dick Adams" > wrote:

>
> "williamwaller" > wrote in message
> news:mailman.8.1080920073.229.rec.food.sourdough@m ail.otherwhen.com...
>
>> I think the beauty of working with "sourdough" starters is there really is
>> no single answer to this question.
>
> But some answers are better than others.
>
>> 1) The easiest... Go to Ed Wood's web site and buy his most sour culture.
>> 2) Migrate your starter's refreshments from white or wheat flours to rye.
>> 3) Choose to build from retained, mature dough rather than sponge.
>> 4) Use your sense of smell to evaluate the fermentation process. Knowing
>> when a dough is ripe is essential practice.
>
> "ww" may still be having some trouble with his sourdough. (He seems to have
> been sucked in by the 'sour starter --> sour bread' myth.)
>
>> 5) Work on a very basic bread (a la Laurel Robertson's Desem example) until
>> you have nailed down the idiosyncrasies of your grain supply, water,
>> micro-climate (proofing box, refrigerator, basement, etc...), oven, and
>> starter behavior.
>
> Won't hurt, but can be omitted.
>
> 6) Stay away from bananas, figs, apricots and other wonderful
> what-have-you's unless you've got Betty Crocker's private phone number. My
> personal feeling is these amendments are better on top of bread rather than
> in it.
>
> Good!
>
> 7) Be sure your "benchmark" bread isn't a highly engineered, atypical
> example of the naturally leavened world.
>
> What is a "highly engineered, atypical example of the naturally leavened
> world?

P.S. What's your bread look like, ww?


Well here goes...


SUCKED IN...
I confess to knowing the difference between a starter and a fermenting
dough. I was referring to ripening DOUGH in my comments (number 4 above) on
smell. Generally my doughs do not have a sour smell. I would be worried
about contamination if they did. Depending on the wheat I mill, the doughs
occasionally smell "cidery". My belief, however, is that whenever a starter
smells sour, it means it's old and needs a refreshment cycle.


BANANAS...
I'm glad we agree on bananas... I have been reading the "fruit wars" posts
lately and trying to understand why one would want to put these amendments
into bread. It seems to me that using fruit on top of the bread is more
logical. You can make better bread and achieve more fruit focus by combining
the two at the table, not the oven. I was tempted to pose that solution
earlier. But then the posts went off into la-la land as everyone approached
the topic literally.

ENGINEERED BREAD...
It only takes a visit to the TMB site to get the engineered bread gestalt.
Imagine what you might do with a lineup of 80 gallon auto-fermenters each
with it's own special lactobacilli brewing away. Combine that with those
marvelous dual purpose retarder/proofers attached to your handy server. You
can get emailed when the dough is ripe!!! In short, most of us cannot dial
in degrees of sourness with computer controlled equipment and most of us do
not make, or aspire to, really "sour" breads either. But the highly
engineered bread is out there. La Brea bakery is serving it up nation-wide.

P.S WHAT'S MY BREAD LOOK LIKE...

It looks like Samartha's. Speaking of which... I use his calculator all of
the time. Works great.

Will

"williamwaller" > wrote in message
news:mailman.9.1080942184.229.rec.food.sourdough@m ail.otherwhen.com...

> ... MY BREAD ... looks like Samartha's.=20

That's good looking bread. Can you post a photo?

> ... I use his calculator all of the time.=20

Maybe my bread would look better if I did that.

It would certainly be more exact.

---
DickA

On Thu, 01 Apr 2004 19:48:02 -0500, Kevin Breit wrote:

> Hey,
> I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
> noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more
sour. > How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor? >
> Kevin

I'll tell you how I made my best sour sour dough. However it may not
help unless you can fill in some blanks because most of this has to do
with look and feel instead of precise measurements. Also all the
liquid I used during the build stage was raw apple cider.

I made this bread at a small commercial bakery and experimented with
sourdough for about a couple of years.

This is what produced the best.

The final dough was built up over the course of 3 days with the final
dough going into the cooler for the last two days then pulled out for
12 hours (this was 35lbs. of dough, however).

The first build was made from a very small amount of very active
slurry. Small amount being less than 1% and mixed to about 45-50%
hydration. This was put into the cooler for two days (weekend).

The next build was a about a 75% increase in weight and kept as stiff
as the previous build. This was kept out during the day (8 hours). If
it looked like a monster (very active) it would be banished to the
cooler again over night. If not it would be left out. The main thing
was not to have the dough at anytime 'break' or, iow, not to have the
acidity level get so high as to break down the gluten structure. It
looked like a final dough (bagel maybe) at all times. It never smelled
sour but, because of the apple cider, sweet and a little winey. The
final dough was made up of 40-50% of the build (depending on the
activity of the biga) and mixed to a look and feel of 65% hydration.
Chopped dried apples soaked in cider and brandy overnight were also
added. If the dough seemed a little weak (wasn't a monster), a pinch
of malt would go in.

This was covered and put into the cooler for two days in a big Hobart
mixing bowel. I kept a little of the biga back and left it out at room
temp for two days to break down into the slurry for next weeks bread.
Most of this however was dumped out before mixing the first build.

On the day of baking after it had been out of the cooler over night
the first thing I did in the morning was to smell the dough. If all
went well, it usually would nearly buckle my knees if I put my head
too far into the mixing bowel. The smell was extremely strong. There
was not any sour smell per se it is more a sweet very kick-the-booty,
up-your-nose-to-your-brain champaign smell. This had to do a lot with
the amount of the dough and that it had been covered for three days.

Anyway this bread had a very deep sour taste that was cut, of course,
by the sweetness of the apples.

Hi Kevin,

I had this problem for a while and here are few things I've done.

1) Decreased the hydration of my starter

I used to use a starter that was very fluid - it would die quickly (one
or two days) and consequently needed lots of refreshing and didn't hold
acidity very well. So lately I've been working from a starter at 66%
hydration. It can stay alive longer and holds it acidity better before
dying.

2) Increase fermentation temp.

The bacteria that really make bread sour like it warmer. I rarely let my
sourdough white breads (those breads where sour is the flavor I'm going for)
ferment below 80F. It means getting creative - I keep my fermentation bucket
over a heater vent in the kitchen and proof my final loaves in a couche,
seated on a cooling rack on the oven while the oven is warming up - usually
an hour.

That's about it - you should be able to smell and taste the acid in a raw
dough before you shape it into loaves. If it tastes yeasty or sweet - your
not getting the action you want from your lactobacilli (the bacteria which
produce the acid in sourdough).

Doesn't mean it still won't be good bread - but it won't have that sourdough
taste.

Good luck - Tom

"Kevin Breit" > wrote in message
news
> Hey,
> I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
> noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more sour.
> How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor?
>
> Kevin

On Fri, 9 Apr 2004 06:47:11 -0700, "Tom Stanton"
> wrote:

>Hi Kevin,
>
>I had this problem for a while and here are few things I've done.
>
>1) Decreased the hydration of my starter
>
> I used to use a starter that was very fluid - it would die quickly (one
>or two days) and consequently needed lots of refreshing and didn't hold
>acidity very well. So lately I've been working from a starter at 66%
>hydration. It can stay alive longer and holds it acidity better before
>dying.
>
>2) Increase fermentation temp.
>
> The bacteria that really make bread sour like it warmer. I rarely let my
>sourdough white breads (those breads where sour is the flavor I'm going for)
>ferment below 80F. It means getting creative - I keep my fermentation bucket
>over a heater vent in the kitchen and proof my final loaves in a couche,
>seated on a cooling rack on the oven while the oven is warming up - usually
>an hour.
>
>That's about it - you should be able to smell and taste the acid in a raw
>dough before you shape it into loaves. If it tastes yeasty or sweet - your
>not getting the action you want from your lactobacilli (the bacteria which
>produce the acid in sourdough).
>
>Doesn't mean it still won't be good bread - but it won't have that sourdough
>taste.
>
>Good luck - Tom
>
>"Kevin Breit" > wrote in message
>news
>> Hey,
>> I made my first successful sourdough loafs today. The one thing I
>> noticed was it tasted too much like fermentation and needed more sour.
>> How do I increase the sourness and less alcohol flavor?
>>
>> Kevin
>

Hi Tom,

".conversation" the of flow the understand to impossible but all is it
,top the at comment your post you Because

..bottom to top from read We

All the best,

--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."

"Kenneth" > wrote in message ...

> ".conversation" the of flow the understand to impossible but
> all is it ,top the at comment your post you Because .bottom
> to top from read We

Kenneth" > wrote in message
...
> On Fri, 9 Apr 2004 06:47:11 -0700, "Tom Stanton"
> > wrote:
>
*snipped**
> >
> Hi Tom,
>
> ".conversation" the of flow the understand to impossible but all is it
> ,top the at comment your post you Because
>
> .bottom to top from read We
>
> All the best,
>
> --
> Kenneth

Oh, sorry for the mix-up: here is what I meant to say.

I've been baking with sourdough for about 2 years now. I built my starter
from some currants I had in my kitchen about 2 years ago.

At home I use the following percentages.
Flour 100% (obivously)
Water 70% (22C or warmer)
Starter 30% (The starter itself is a 66% hydration starter)
Salt 2.2%

The starter comes direct from the fridge, so the warm water helps liven it
up.

1) I generally bulk ferment at 25C or higher (through various methods). I
think the higher temps give me more lacto activity.
2) After 1 or 2 punchdowns (depending on the scent of the dough) I shape my
loaves and do a final proof above the oven where it is pretty warm.

I get great results - really sour. Now, if I let the loaves rise alot after
being shaped, I can get a really open crumb. If I throw them in sooner - I
keep a tighter, more uniform crumb that works better for sandwiches. Here is
the X factor - I buy my flour from a local consortium of farmers who sell a
particularly hard strain of wheat. Since I worked as a baker, I can buy this
really high protein (16-20%) flour that allows my gluten to stay intact even
with relatively long warm rises.

If I add 10% whole wheat flour (pain de compagne) then, I need to reduce the
rise times a bit.

The two things that have really helped my flavor have been:

a) drying out my starter - I used to run it at something more like 100%
hydration
b) warmer rises - really seems to give me a better (more sour) flavor

Hope that helps - Tom