r/SourdoughStarter

Started on March 31st. Today It doubled after 5 hours. On our way to sourdough bread! Now to name her🤔 I used 25g each of whole wheat flour water and starter. Today I used a baby food jar and fed it 15g each. My kitchen is probably around 78 degrees F.

Hi, this is my first ever loaf and I literally started this week. I know I messed up but I dont know where. Did I just not cook it long enough or something else? I think I messed up the actual starter but im not sure. plz help and give tips

My sister gifted me some of her starter - here she is after her first feed! I haven’t done this since the classic 2020 sourdough era and I’m really excited for this hobby again.

Bake 2 with young starter

425 in heated Dutch oven

30 minutes covered / 15 minutes uncovered.

First bake oven was too hot, bread undercooked

Today - these loaves (two different strains) less underbaked. We baked at 425 and that temp seemed to be correct. Just needed to possibly bake covered longer. They sound hollow as anything when we pulled them.

Bottom is getting too done

Neither strain is sour enough

Pleased with our results for sure but need to get it tangier and need to perfect the Baking so any tips would be greatly appreciated.

So.... it's been a ride. Admittedly I have not been the most attentive, there has been a lot of trial and error, I may have actually killed it once (possibly twice). This may be a testament to stubbornness and futility but here's where we are at:

Started back in December, mistake #1. We don't use the heater so the house was cold (~50°f) and after the initial false rise it was flat & I mean absolutely zero activity for a good 10 days. At which point I decided to put him in the oven with the light on pretty much 24/7, mistake #2.

During this entire time I was feeding 1:1:1 by weight every day.

I saw a little activity after a few hours in the oven so I thought it was a good plan but by the next day it was completely flat and it was quite warm in the oven. but I kept him in there for a couple more days just to see. I don't have a thermometer in there so idk the actual temp, mistake #3 and the first probable death of Mr. Butter.

I made a cozy and moved him back to the counter. Queue another several weeks of nothing. Eventually I forgot about him for a day and actually got some activity and a yeast smell. so i kept up the 48hr feeds getting bubbles but no actual rise for weeks.

Finally when the weather started warming up it started rising but would smell very strongly of acetone. I changed to 10g starter, 50g water, 50g flour every 24 hrs. It'll smell great, like sourdough should, about an hour after I feed it but 10 hours in the SOB will be straight acetone again.

WTF do I dooooo???? is it time to just scrap it?

Note:

There has never been any discoloration or mold. Nor has there been any off or foul smell other than acetone.

Hi guys this is a fresh starter ive made recently, i need help as my starter has stopped rising since long ago, the smell was super sour then more yogurt like, and as time passed it started smelling like dough and now more bread like I’d say. Anyways, is it active? Or should I give up, im kind of lost. I feed it 1:1:1 every 24hrs ! And I scrap what’s left. Any help or advice is appreciated. I also keep it in a warm spot at all times and my house is warm especially now that it’s spring so I don’t think that could be the issue.

I also wanna add to this that I use white bread AP flour, so no rye flour at all. I’ve read that that could also be used as advantage to make the process fasten up but idk!!

My start is still less than a week old but I want to downsize to this small jar cause it’s getting hard to keep the bigger one clean. My question is would I kill him if I do that?

🍞✨

I baked my loaf using the following measurements:

100g starter

350g water

500g flour

10g salt

I did 2 sets of stretch and fold and 2 sets of coil and fold every 45 mins. It was beautifully bubbly throughout the whole process so I had my hopes up. Then after the last 45min I shaped it but it was still slightly sticky then stuck it in the fridge for 12 hours.I think I should’ve let it proof for longer before putting it in the fridge but I’m still new to this so I wasn’t sure. Had some mishap while scoring it because it was still sticky but I refused to give up so I transferred it to the Dutch oven. Baked it at 210*C because that’s the highest my oven can go for 40 mins with the lid on then 15 mins with the lid off.

I’m not sure about the temperature of my kitchen I couldn’t be bothered to stress about the tiny details because I was excited to make this loaf.

What do you think went wrong and how should I improve?

I followed the Elaine Boddy method for this one. I made two loaves last time, one with more starter and one with more water and the one with more starter seemed to be almost there but I thought I might have under proofed it. So this time I followed the exact same recipe but left it to proof for approx 16 hours. I just get the same results time and time again. This is cooked at 240 (the highest my fan oven will go) in a ceramic bread oven for 55 minutes covered.

She’s gonna spend the night in the fridge before the big day tomorrow !

Wish her and me luck :D first trial.

Was kept in the fridge originally but was taken out a while ago and has been sat on the windowsill for probably a few months now untouched. Smells fine and looks relatively normal but I wanna know if it’s still safe before I poison anyone