Around 6/3 I received my shipment with the sour dough crock pot and starter. I noticed the date on the starter was the same day as I got the shipment so I called right away and asked if it would still work with it being the expired date. I was told that it should be no problem. I made it per directions, it rose beautifully and I have been feeding it each time I pull some out for baking or at least once a week. I don't make a lot of bread, one to two loaves a week and rolls thrown in, because there are only two of us. Each time I make a loaf or rolls, it still has just a faint hint of sour dough. What should I do or is it the starter is not strong enough?
I even added it to the No-knead recipe of which I also have questions. I was not sure how much starter to exchange for water, so I added 1 1/2 cups starter and the rest of the water 1 1/2 cups. Way to hard to even mix so I added another cup of water, still terribly hard to mix so wet my hand and kept trying to work in water. I did not want to handle it too much but it just would not mix in the flour. I used the 6 1/2 cups of flour dip method. It rose pretty well but no way to pull off a ball, so I cut off a chunk and rolled into a long roll and baked. The sour dough taste was still mild. It was tasty but tough. I cut in 4th and by the second and 3 loaf, it still did not pick up a sour dough flavor. We are talking about 2 weeks gone by at this point.
My questions are how much starter should I use for the no-knead recipe or any type of bread and when it is not a true sour dough recipe and is my sour dough ok. How do I make it have a flavor of sour dough. I don't like strong sour dough flavor but want to tell a difference from white bread.
August 10, 2015 at 3:56pm