I had a lump of "Pte Fermentée" or "Old Dough" as a sort of fake sourdough
starter (using commercial yeast) and I wanted to convert it to true
sourdough. The original thread is still up on this NG if you wish to review
it.

In his reply, Charles Perry wrote:

>There is a theoretical possibility that the starter could be taken over
>by real sourdough critters because they are happy with continuous
>propagation. Not likely though.

>Why don't you try it and report back, You have nothing to lose except
>your time and a little flour.

Many thanks to Charles and to everybody else who replied to that post. I
learned a lot and was encouraged by the input.

I have NOT added any more commercial yeast to that mass since November 12,
but I kept using most of it and refreshing whatever remained with flour and
water ONLY.

Three days ago, I began refreshing it with unbleached A/P flour in equal
portions of the starter, flour, and water instead of the usual dark rye
flour. This morning I fed it again with the unbleached A/P flour. At 10:30
this morning, a one-gallon pickle jar with a lid was filled to about 2.75
inches from the table. By 3:30 this afternoon, the stuff had expanded to
about 6.75 inches from the table in the same gallon jar and had started to
fall about a half inch from there to about 6.25 inches. When I removed the
lid, I heard a "whooosh!" I stuck my nose into the jar to smell it and it
was like snorting a shot of whisky! I stirred it and it went back down to
its original mark in the jar. It's really sour and very white. It has
about the consistancy of peanut butter, except that it is elastic like
dough. The house temperature ranges from about 65 degrees at night to about
75 degrees in the afternoon

Now the question: What to do now? Feed it? Use it? By my description,
does it sound ready for some breadmaking?

Rich