Tuesday, October 26, 2010

New Dough in Town

I made a new sourdough starter. I still have Sid.
Sid is good.
Sid is easy going.
Sid still reigns supreme.

Now I have Walter. Where Sid is a milk-based starter, Walter is a water-based starter.

I made Walter 20 days ago. Ten days later, I made a some artisan loaves with him. He tasted yummy. Not quite as yeasty as Sid, but still, he was good.  Then I fed him. The little guy was a glutton! It was my fault though. I gave him 3 times the amount of sugar! I realized that and then had to adjust his flour and water accordingly! I'm not sure how he'll taste the next time I make bread with him.

Flash Forward one month later:  Walter is the Shiz.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Oh Walter...

Here's a blues song. After each sentence you can flourish it with your own "blues sound" (i.e. bum DUH da  dum, da dum, da dum, da dum, bum DUH da dum,etc.)

I woke up this morning (insert blues sound)
I mixed up some dough (blues sound)
I was in a hurry (blues sound)
I had somewhere to go! (blues sound)

I heated up the water (you know what to do)
I waited for the right temp (.....)
I added some more flour (....)
I did not add hemp (.... okay, okay, so I needed a rhyming word + it's a true statement! Of course, I wouldn't know where to get such stuff. I've seen it in health food stores, not-so-secretly- added to chips among some other things. Oh, and it's in the craft shops too; in yarn and jewelry supplies. Back to the blues!)

Here's the part of the song where you can really let it go....think House of Blues....think laundry!

The dough mixed up nicely (blues sound)
It smelled pretty good too (blues sound)
I dumped it out on the counter (.....)
It was a big gob of goo (...)

More flour was kneaded needed (blues sound)
The dough wouldn't let it in (get grungy with it, because my frustration at this point is high. The dough was NOT letting the flour incorporate)
I fussed at the dough ball and looked at the jar and when I realized that Walter was still in the jar, I felt real apologetic, because I wasn't making sourdough at all, I just had a big ball of gooey dough and poor Walter wasn't a part of it at all! (okay, so I'm not much of a song writer and I ruined your groove. My groove was ruined too).

Song over.
Story not over.

I added 1 cup of Walter (the new sourdough starter,yes I still have Sid) to the dough and got my hands reeeeeeeeeeeal goopy. Then I got all improvisational with it and added a tad more flour and a tad more Walter. When it was all said and done, I had a very dense ball of sourdough. And because Walter was such a glutton after to first time I fed him (I gave him 3x the amount of sugar and had to compensate with more flour and water) I'm not real sure how it's all going to turn out.

I've got the sourdough blues.