sourdough

Jo Jo sent me a sourdough starter crock for my birthday. Nothing fancy, just a ceramic canister with a loose-fitting lid, just right for containing a live culture of wild yeast. We had a short conversation about fermented foods at Thanksgiving, and true to her resourceful and benevolent nature, my sister followed through by taking action on a good idea.

Then she followed-up with an e-mail of step-by-step instructions on how to get started. Having talked up the whole notion of Wild Fermentation in the first place, I couldn't very well do nothing, so I gave it a try.

The instructions sounded a little too easy, but the results seemed to follow as expected. All I had to do was mix equal amounts of flour and warm water and leave it in the crock for a few days. As long as the temperature is moderate, that is, not cold enough to stop microorganisms and hot enough to kill them, they would find their way to the wheaty medium. Every day I added a little more flour and warm water to feed the little beasts, and every day the culture in a crock had a bit more bubble bubble with no toil and trouble.

After a week it appeared to be ready, so I treated it just like a yeasted dough and let it rise in a warm place before shaping loaves. Well, that didn't work too well. The weather was very cold, so the woodstove in the den was very hot, and it might have killed the friendly yeast colony. Or the timing could have been wrong (too much? too little?), and incidentally I forgot to add salt (duh!), so the bread was inedible. I'm sure it made superlative compost.

So I tried again, this time adding a tiny bit of honey from a rooftop garden in New York. Following the same procedure, adding a little flour and water each day, by the next weekend the starter looked bubbly and ready. This time I let it sit longer next to a warm but not hot stove, and I remembered to add salt. The loaves came out dense but tasty - if you like sour. It's definitely sourdough.

A little bit of the starter is saved from each batch, so this culture of wild central swingstate yeast and wheat is still growing. This time I'm using white flour to see what difference it makes. I'm hoping for a little lighter texture. So far so good, as the familiar bubbles are appearing on top when I check it at night.

At this moment, as I write I am chewing a mouthful of sourdough bread topped with pepperjack cheese. Yum.