[Sca-cooks] Starter went 'Pffft'
Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius
adamantius.magister at verizon.net
Mon Nov 29 10:42:29 PST 2004
Also sprach Chris Stanifer:
>--- Terry Decker <t.d.decker at worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
>> The "sour" in sourdough doesn't refer to the taste, it refers to the
>> spontaneous fermentation. You are "souring" the starter.
>
>
>Please direct me to the references for this statement. I believe
>there may be some misinformation
>in it.
Hmmm. You've made a starter which has evidently picked up some
airborne yeasts, which you hope to culture and use as bread
leavening. You note that it's starting to bubble, but not yet sour.
Am I remembering that correctly?
I think the point of Bear's statement is that the purpose of a
sourdough starter, assuming you're using it to leaven, is that it has
airborne yeasts cultured in it, and these yeasts, in the early stages
of the culture, have not mutated and begun to produce sour
by-products, nor have lactobacilli had a chance to get into the
picture, which is why your sourdough isn't sour tasting yet. However,
it is still sourdough, and a good way to get it to taste more sour is
to use it a time or two.
An example along similar lines might be the fact that sauerkraut has
had that lactic fermentation take place, whereas cabbage pickled with
vinegar is just pickled cabbage, even though it is sour...
Okay, so the examples ain't helping. I tried ;-)
Adamantius
--
"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils mangent de la
brioche!" / "If they have no bread, you have to say, let them eat
brioche."
-- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques
Rousseau, "Confessions", pub 1782
"Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
-- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry
Holt, 07/29/04
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