viola

August 16, 2015 at 12:41pm

It's too hot in Virginia to wait until afternoon to turn on the oven...so I use my bread machine to do the initial kneading and 1st rise. My starter has often not been fed for 4 or 5 days at this point. I wonder if I'm fooling myself, but after I add the starter to the pan, I then stir in the water required for the recipe, and then, from the first measured cup of flour, I stir in only about the same amount of the flour as the water just added. I then dump the remaining flour from that cup as well as the rest of the required flour, salt and sugar or even honey (which will sit fairly nicely in a well on top until the paddles stir it in), and finally the yeast (in a small hole of its own). I tell myself this is much the same as 'feeding' the starter, but without the keeping-an-eye-on-it wait. It sits in the breadpan overnight, and when I get up, it is ready to shape and do the next rise in my clay baker or cloche. Does doing it this way 'count' as feeding the starter? It SEEMS to raise nicely....but maybe it would raise even more if I fed it as you prescribe?
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