My Bread Journey - Sourdough and Others

To answer my question about black sludge.......

Q. My sourdough starter has dark liquid on top. Did I damage it?

A. The dark liquid is a form of naturally-occurring alcohol known as hooch, which indicates that your sourdough starter is hungry. Hooch is harmless but should be poured off and discarded prior to stirring and feeding your starter. If hooch is forming on your starter regularly, increase the feeding frequency and/or move the starter to a cooler spot (70-85ºF), to slow things down.

@Bear ^^^^ your starter sounds hungry.

 

Beer bread is another good method. Lol I hope you didn't waste good beer on it?

 

Aloha Gang,

Beer and Bread!.... now add Bacon and you have the 3 fundamental "C's" of life

More fun on the sourdough journey....

Ok... wanted to see how long the starter would survive in my fridge... have 3 of them in there.... redundancy in case one or two don't make it ....

Yuck... black sludge on top.... doesn't look good.... pour it off and feed it.... 3 hours later... still not rising like before... feed it some more... and voila... she's happy again....

Now... more experimentation.... dough with the copied recipe is just too wet.... too too wet....

Add 1/2 cup more flour... little less water and 1/4 cup more starter... same amount of salt....

Aahhhhh.... a little better...

Bake it up.... and yes..... it works...

Give one to @Hanzo for him to try... of course I gave him a taste test first with some butter ... if he gagged I wasn't going to send him home with one of my "babies" no matter how good a friend he is... LOL....

Good stuff....

Flour , water, salt.... easy enough for a bear to remember.... yeah I know ... starter too... but starter is just flour and water ... and little beasties that poop out black sludge to let you know they are really really hungry

Thanks for all the comments, thoughts, suggestions and guidance.... us old amateur bread bears.... need all the help and encouragement we can get...

Have a great Day!

Take Care and God Bless,

Bear

 

Nice very pretty loaves

We haven't heard from @Hanzo. Did he survive the bread test?

 

@Bear did you ever try a 'wild' sour dough start?

 

Someone should know the answer to this. My group will need 6 loaves of whole wheat bread a day. That is six loaf pans to wash each day and hot soapy water may be in short supply. Will lining a loaf pan with foil have any adverse effect on the bread?

 

Just don't wash the pans, re-oil sides wipe it out and oil again before you bake.

Water and soap for baking is over rated. The heat from baking sterilize everything.

 

@Hanzo paging @Hanzo you're ignoring a member here.... @Ganado thinks you died after you ate my bread!

 

Not yet... I know... I'm such a slacker... gotta fire up a Bahrain starter as well... supposed to be one of the most sour....
Will keep you posted @Ganado

Drying out some of my original starter in the fridge... for a Bear Sourdough experiment...

Anyone want to try to revive it... I'll send some of the little beasties that I let dehydrate in the fridge in a little zip lock... and you let me know if you can revive it...

Any takers?... hmmmmm......

Have a great weekend all...

Take Care and God Bless,

Bear

 

@T. Riley Foil is expensive but a great resource... I would use parchment paper... Reynolds says it's good up to 420 degrees...

Gonna try some in the dutch oven with these loaves....

 

Sorry @Ganado, I did not see your post.

Just kidding. The sourdough was very good. 3 of 4 hanzo ohana really liked it. The big monkey is the most finicky eater. We had it plain, with Irish butter, and as cheesy garlic sourdough. I think I might like it simple, with just butter, the best. But would like it more sour.

 

But I did. Died and went to heaven. You could market it that way... after you make it more sour, the way your pretty Miss Bear prefers it too.

 

HE LiVES!

 

I would not line the pan. IMO, cleaning a bread pan is wiping down/light washing. It would need a light washing so the oil on the pan doesn't go rancid but scrubbing and lots of water use not really required. The old fashion way to wash dishes was to fill on small tub with soap water and another tub with rinse water. If you are worried about water wasting then either do parchment paper or get pizza stone. The bread will be flatter on a pizza stone but you will not need to wash. Just throw down some cornmeal prior to baking.

 

For this application use Non Stick pans.

 

@Bear for his Bread in the Bushcraft threads, easy to remember with Bear logic

Baking Bread in a Dutch Oven
Dutch ovens were made for baking. In the hands of a practiced baker, a Dutch
oven will create beautiful breads and desserts. (Though some of us tend to burn
breads in a Dutch oven.) You can always bake bread in a well-oiled Dutch oven but instead of baking directly in the oven, consider this method: Put the dough in a baking pan and the pan in the Dutch oven.
Recently, a reader from California told us of her success baking bread with a pan
inside of a Dutch oven. She used a mix for Irish Potato Bread. This mix creates
a large loaf and she made it according to package instructions. She formed the
dough into a round loaf and placed the dough in a greased nine-inch metal pie
pan. She then set the pan atop small rocks in the bottom of her twelve-inch
Dutch oven. She put the lid on the Dutch oven and the oven on ten briquette
coals. Another fourteen briquettes went on the top. She baked the bread for 45
minutes, turning the lid occasionally. She was baking at an elevation of 7,000 in
the Sequoia Mountains.
“I was surprised and delighted to find that the bread was perfect,” she said. “The
crust was brown on top and it was a real treat . . . a great success.”
You should have similar success baking rolls on a baking pan or a loaf in a
traditional bread pan. To get the right-sized loaves for a Dutch oven, consider
bread machine mixes or recipes for single loaves. A bread machine mix will give
you that single loaf or smaller batch of rolls, just right for a Dutch oven. If you
crowd two loaves into a Dutch oven, there may not be adequate air circulation
between the loaves. Without adequate space, the loaves will tend to be
lopsided.
It is important that you elevate the pan off the bottom of the Dutch oven using
small stones so that it does not burn the bottom of the bread. Make sure that you
have enough top clearance so that the rising bread does not reach the lid.
You can use this same technique to bake great desserts or pastries. Consider
baking sweet rolls or pastries in a raised pan in your Dutch oven.

This came from here. Cooking & Food - Emergency and Outdoor Bread Manual | Survival Forums

 

Call me Chucky?

 

Jason.