You can read about this in detail in my free book called “The Sourdough Framework”. You can get it here: breadco.de/book. You can support the project with a donation, but there is absolutely no knead. I believe information like this should be free and accessible to everyone. The book is made for everyone who wants to understand the important details when making sourdough bread. Thank you!
The best starter I have ever made was from the small piece of dough from the day before. It never grew in the little jar, but it turned into a wonderful active starter. This is actually the same method my great grandmother used over 80 years ago. She took a piece of dough and kept it under flour until the following week. She baked 12 loaves at once for the whole week
One warning and note, after converting your starter into liquid starter you will permanently change your starter's microorganisms. I couldn't get back the acetic vinegary notes. This vinegary flavour is excellent though in case you are making rye bread for instance. So please keep this in mind and also make a backup. Also another note, some people who make the starter initially from fruit water never get the vinegary notes at all. It's fascinating and just shows one more time how unique every sourdough starter is. Sank you. Edit: Had fun with my new camera 🤣. What do you think? What can I improve? Edit 2: I also just wrote down the key differences of all the starters in my blog post. I hope it helps: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2021/10/24/all-you-need-to-know-stiff-liquid-regular-starter.html
Would the extra adult balloon filling of the stiffer starter not be because there is more “fuel” with more flour? The available carbohydrates that can be decomposed into CO2 is much higher than a liquid starter even if it is a activity highway.
Honestly, your new camera is too good. The bokeh is so strong it makes you look like a cartoon character. But it is great for filming the starter and dough and bread, basically anything on the counter. Just not your face ☹️. Sorry to say.
I would like more silly German jokes and craziness please. Especially the scary voices. Very entertaining. I think it would be great to hear you speak in whatever voice you think the bread might be making or perhaps the micro organisms and wild yeasts. That would be such fun.
The best solution ever! I was tired to maintain a liquid starter and also the waste of flour it’s insane.!. I decided to give a try to the stiff starter and my relationship with sourdough starter changed for good. The Bread Code is the best resource to learn about sourdough. Danke schön!
I will be trying a stiff starter. My dad made sour dough bread all my life. I can't believe we never talked about it because I took it so for granted. He was a cook for the sheepherders in northern Arizona and New Mexico for 17 years so he had cooking out in the country down to an art everything was cooked underground in cast iron. I so regret not asking more questions because those secrets are gone from me forever. I've been working with sourdough for about 3 months now and have only had a couple of successes. My starter's name is Pedro, in other words, Peter Pan, pan is the Spanish word for bread and Pedro is the Spanish word for peter, thus Pedro.🤓
That would have been right up my ally to experience and see his cooking that way. Many primitive ways of cooking is so interesting. And different cultures cont. with that tradition passing it down generation to generation.
Oh your dad must have had wonderful stories to tell and great cooking ideas! I am in the same position - my dad was Italian, grew up in the countryside and knew how to make everything and stupid here did not learn from him and now it is too late. Still we were lucky to have interesting fathers!
I come from a long line of German bakers(and millers (the house in which the bakery was is from 1150 and our mill is even older) and love bread. I lived in Paris and Spain and always found the best bakers. Your explanations are extremely good and I hope many people get convinced to make their own bread. One thing: in the States 99% of the flower is bromated. That is illegal in the rest of the world because it is cancerous. I recommend King Arthur flours: never bromated, never bleached. They have fantastic flours (I use the super high protein Lancelot) and you will find better flour only in France (and spelt in Germany). The cheap flour here in the US is actually harmful. Your "stiff" starter is like pasta madre. I recommend Ian Spampatti's channel to all bread lovers.
I have two starters one is regular sour starter and the other has no sourness at all and i use them together 50/50. So it's fluffy and tasty. And i can increase one of them to have either more sourness or less.
What is the no sourness starter? How do you make that? Do you do this stiff starter for no sourness? How often do you feed it and maintain it to be no-sour?
Henrick, I've been following your journey for the past year, and I love how you have run the complete gambit from super watery to this new stiff starter method. For a lazy guy, you've achieved a Sourdough knowledge anthology! Thank you!
Thank you very much 🤗. It depends on what bread I am trying to bake. With my super expensive flour I can use the liquid starter, with the default one the stiff starter seems to work a bit better.
This really works!! One of my regular customers texted me saying that my "other" bread was "like steak" (and she loved it), but this week's bread made with the stiff starter was lighter "like bread", she said. My kitchen here in central Texas is quite warm, so not sure if it was due to the ambient temp or the starter, but it proofed fast and resulted in a super light dough.
I made 2 loafs, one with my regular starter and the other with my first stiff starter. I did the stiff first, I kept your basic recipe as close as I could, 80% hydration using white bread flour and whole wheat BF. The day was hot, 77 (25) in the house, very unusual for April in upstate NY. They both fermented nicely with the regular sourdough inflating more than the stiff even though it was started an hour later. The most surprising thing is the ph of the stiff was much lower at time of baking, 4.05 vs 4.2. The spring was great, but I bungled the scoring on the regular starter loaf, so it isn't very symmetrical. Thanks for all the experiments you do! I usually make 2 loaves at a time since my oven will fit 2 dutch ovens so I can do my own experiments. I've started half baking one loaf and leave it in the fridge until I need it. It works great.
Tried the stiff starter and loved it! The result was way more spring than my regular sourdough method and it was much easier to work with as it was not at all sticky. Thank you very much.
I gave up making sourdough bread in the past because it came out flat. Now I know why😃😃. Thank you for sharing this knowledge. Right now, I am on day one of stiff starter process. Wish me luck!!!
Dear Hendrick, so glad I came across you channel. The level of detail, the experiments, the clear step by step instruction and the humor make your channel exceptional. Thank you so much for all your hard work
I actually started to use the stiff starter from when I first watched your yeast vs sour vs mild video and i super love my bread ever since! The tang that it gives is really right for me. I dont personally like too sour bread and it's especially hard before since it's easy to mess up the fermentation when living in a hotter climate. Using the stiff starter is truly a game changer! (I super love your videos and Ive probably watched your videos at least 10 times per video for reference 😂) Much love and greetings from singapore!
Haha awesome! Thank you. Also love your comment as it shows how much this all ultimately boils down to personal preference. To the others, this video doesn't mean this is the best option, it's just another alternative. Sometimes it's a little hard to put that all in one video 🤣
Recently found your channel! As an electrical engineer , finding relaxation with bread- making in my kitchen, I absolutely luv your analytical style! Thanks to all your pointers I am finally seeing some success with rise and crumb, thank you so much! You are a terrific teacher. THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! I knew I shared many things in common with my many Germans friends , my Leica, my Eurasier puppy, and now its my sourdough! Hooked on your channel- keep up your great work! Cheers!👍🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦
I just want to say I love watching your videos and enjoy all the information you provide! I just started my sourdough journey back in January this year and it blows my mind at how much I'm still learning about the whole process! I'm very intrigued by the stiff starter and am probably going to start converting some of my 100% hydration starter into a stiff starter tonight to start experimenting with it! Thank you for all the research you've done (along with your experiments) and for sharing it with us!
Love your videos. A couple of thoughts to thank you. Hope they prove of interest and value. 1. When scoring proofed bread prior to baking - dip the sharp thin blade in olive oil to lubricate it. It reduces the potential of tearing the dough. 2. Try short autolysis times - 1 to 30 minutes. Less destruction of gluten network, more improved taste than longer times.
I'm still experimenting with my stiff starter, and it has been a good experience so far! My last sourdough burger buns with stiff starter turned out incredible. They exploded in size after shaping. I never had such huge fluffy and delicious buns. I'm looking forward to my next bake, which I think might be the recipe in this video. Thank you and may the gluten be with you 😘
I used to experiment with low hydration starters as well. What I noticed is that they (at least for me) ran bad much quicker than 100% hydration starters. And as I sometimes leave my starters in the fridge for more than a month without feeding them the 100% hydration works much better for me. Never had any mold issues or bad smell with these. Probably because they are more sour I suppose.
Thanks for this video. I live in the bush in west Australia and it’s summertime now so my kitchen which is outside ranges from mid 20c overnight to upwards of 40c during the day. I agonised over failure after failure trying to create good crumb until I started to think about this yeast and bacteria balance. At last I’m making reasonable sourdough. With the info in this video I can feel greater success coming. By the way the dogs are quite happy with a bit of the gooey sour pancake bread. And the worms in my worm farm love it. 🙄
Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, experience and wisdom! I have been banging my head against that wall with trying to figure out why my dough is so sticky!! God Bless you!!
I made a small loaf from a stiff starter and it turns out fluffy and delicious I don’t have a strong starter yet (mine is 2 weeks old) and all my bast loafs was failed so I think I’ll just stick to the stiff starter for now thank you so much (excuse my weak english)
This really works! I just produced a fluffy loaf with lots of flavour. If you need a break from the slightly gummy texture of SD, this is the answer. Love it!
Switched my starter from 100% hydration rye to 50% KA bread flour. Didn’t make liquid starter step. Baked 3 times with the stiff starter, great results. Flavor is not sour at all. Stupendous oven spring!
As a newbie, my first starters were either watery or at least thin. The results were hockey pucks. Even before I saw this video I started experimenting with thicker starter... not as thick as yours, however. The thicker starter (it hardly wants to come out of the jar!) resulted in more proofing and oven spring (by the way, I live at 4,300 ft elevation). So I know that you are on the right track for me! Thanks for the video!
Ah! Now I understand why my new starter works so well. It's stiffer than my previous one. It doesn't stick (yeah!), and has an excellent rise. And so yummy.
wow an excellent experiment. my previous starter died from neglect. beginning a new one so challenging 😢. but I want more yeast than bacteria so am following your Stiff Starter method. D1 results impressive, now into D2. Here in MY really difficult to find 15%hp flour so am waiting to see how this SS improves texture n taste of d 11%hp dough. Thanks so much for all yr bread engineering journey, can't find a more useful site than yours, keep up d good work Henrick 👍
Hydration winter: 300g water +80g starter that contains 33,3 % water makes about 326g water to 400g flour: Dough hydration = 81,5% which is quite wet with the flour I use….so it may be a stiff starter but a wet dough? (Summer recepe is around 78,5%)
It took a couple of seconds for me to realize you said "adult balloons". 🙂 Thank you for explaining everything so well and differently from other videos I have watched that were more basic that didn't go into the different ways of hydrating your starter. I have struggled over the years making sourdough .... I usually get very dense bread. I will give your method a try.
LMAO. Thanks for this video. I have always used a thin starter, but I was living in California where temps were always moderate to warm. Now that I’m in Maine, my starter has been soo sad! 😢 I actually started increasing the flour at feeding instinctually, but I’m happy to hear that I’m on the right track. I may get this SOURDOUGH ART yet. ❤
I have been baking with this method for a while now. Stiff starter made of 100% wheat whole grain, baking 80% white flour/20% whole grain breads. I use good flour and all, but lately my fermentations have been quite weak. Not as much gas production and mediocre oven spring. Not sure what it is, i feed it at least twice from the fridge before use. I will try out the doubled amount of starter in the recipe. In the coming days i will test, if you can store the stiff starter in a freezer and use it directly for standard recipes. I'd have several 10 g balls of stiff starter in the freezer. For each bake, take one ball, thaw it, feed it twice over 24 h at 1:1:2 (10+10+20 = 40 g; 40+40+80 = 160 g, or ~100 g of flour) and put everything into a standard recipe for a 500 g flour bread.
I use Lievito Madre (Stiff/ Mother Dough) for all my breads since last year. This look like Lievito Madre minus the sugar water bath method. Tq for sharing Hendrik ❤
Рік тому
I feed my starter twice a day at 100% hydration. I will definitely be trying out the stiff starter for a bit. The local flour we have in PR doesn't really work for breads above 65%, and I supplement with vital gluten to achieve that. Still, I've been baking daily for over two years now! It's really interesting to keep learning more about it!
Thanks Hendrik. I have experimented with a stiff starter for 2 months or so. I have had moderate, but not the "kaboom whay hey look at my bread, folks" sucess as with my 100 pc hydration starter. I find I have to pay attention to the fermentation more, and it is in danger of over fermenting, even with only 50pc expansion in bulk rise, with 12 percent protien.
Going to try the stiff starter, thank you! Just wondering though, the bread with the stuff starter be less better for you gut health wise? Great video x
Love from a new subscriber! I’m so enjoying your content and learning a TON about baking bread and raising starters. I traveled around Germany about 20 years ago and just loved the country and the people. I miss it! Gluten tag!!
Fascinating! Do you just keep feeding 1-1-2 everyday until you decide to bake? Then this “stiff” starter is used in the leaven? Thank you for any helpful comments 😊
Just love the monthztztz. English is also a second language for me and that is always one of the difficult ones, like schedule and sheets. (I still wouldn't say the last one in front of young children! 😅) Thank you so much for this video. All those different starters and uses for them can be very confusing. I'm going to try the sausage for me next bake. 😊
from my previous comments you know how much we love you...two things to point out 1. when you do create your stiff sourdough starter you did not mention when it'll be ready to use for mixing my bread dough, is it immediately, do you have to wait till it reaches a certain ph or size increase or what, forgive me but I am a little confused...2. you said afterwards we'll have a little sourdough left and you suggested to put it in the fridge, alas your video show the freezer opening and closing to store your starter, well? Freezer or fridge? and what difference can you expect in either case? thank you
I would recommend to look on the edges of the container and check for some bubbles. That's a sign it's ready to be used! Also use your nose, it should have a great scent to it. Fridge if you want to bake in the next 7 days. Freezer for long term storage. Your microbes will sporulate and then become activated again when you add water and flour again.
Hello! Last year I purchased an old copy of Arizona Recipes from a thrift store. One of the sourdough starters used soured milk and flour. I'm both lactose and gluten intolerant, but decided to give it a try. I'm using whole rye flour and, instead of milk, I used the whey milk left over from making raw cream butter. Ironically, I have a tolerance for raw milk and cream... I'll let you know the results. The starter is still very new, but very tangy, like I like it!
Hey Jaki. Oh noes! In that case please try making a liquid starter. And - please try using ancient grains such as Einkorn. Let it ferment for a long time and then store it in a loaf pan. Wait for it to increase in size again then bake it. This way you will have as little gluten left as possible. Only take a tiny bite to see how it impacts you. The key is really to have a very long fermentation.
@@the_bread_code Thank you! I have 4 starters going: Stiff. 50/50 rye flour and spring water. Liquid: 50/250 rye and water Milk: 50/50 rye and soured milk The last is a combination of water and milk with the rye. They all taste different. Favorites so far for flavor are the liquid and the milk ones. I'll try to find einkorn flour. My local healthfood store can order I it for me. Thank you again!👍
Wow, I loved when I got my starter going, but neither my wife nor me are into the vinegary notes or too sour flavors, so I´m currently switching to liquid starter and in a couple of weeks switching to stiff, so looking forward to see and taste the results.. Thank you for the tips
@@the_bread_code I finally finished going from regular to liquid to stiff and yeah, is just like you said, you need to check how the smell changes, but in the third day after switching to stiff the starter more than doubles once fed, and the bread is really soft and even fluffier than if you use regular dry yeast. Lovely oven spring considering I only cover it with a steel bowl since I don't have a dutch oven yet and it still has some acidity but not excessive and no longer tastes vinegary, my wife loved it. Oh, and it tastes incredible with Nutella (hope I don't wrath the bread gods hehe). Thank you so much.
Henrick, I'll admit after watching the video and making it, I was still very sceptical. After all, how could such a stiff blob of dough actually do anything other than just sit there like... a blob? Well, I wouldn't have believed it. After trying it, not only did it produce the desired activity, but it produced the best sourdough ever, with a perfect rise and ear.... Thanks!
Hi, thank you for your videos! Can you tell me how to make a stiff starter from the very beginning without a regular starter? Or in any case I need to convert my regular starter for it? I'm new in sourdough making))
Thank you so much for sharing all of this great info! I have learned so much from watching your channel. I am new to sourdough and am finally starting to get some decent/edible results lol
i thought the stiff starter was interesting. so i tried coverting my sourdough to the stiff starter. the first day was fine (10 g my starter, 25 g water, 50 g flour) left at room temperature. i doubled no problem. day 2 -- 10 g starter, 25 g water, 50 g flour -- put into fridge after feeding. day 3 -- disaster -- the starter was so stiff i had to pinch out the 10 g starter, added the 25 g water and can't get the 2 to mix, the starter refused to dissolve! what did i do wrong?
Henrick, I LOVE your videos, and I'm making my first stiff starter. Two questions: 1. My regular starter was made with all-purpose flour, but I did my first feeding of the stiff starter with bread flour. I do want a more sour dough. Was that okay? 2. Can I put the discard from the stiff starter into my jar of regular discard? I use my discard in other recipes (i.e. brownies, pancakes, etc.). Thank you for all your great information. By the way, if you had a t-shirt with a large design or logo on the front, I'd buy one.
You didn't respond to my question, hope you see it, realize you're busy, but do you ever add gluten powder directly to your flower to boost the protein? I am unable to find very high protein flour in bulk where I live, and was thinking of buying wheat gluten and adding it to my flower.
That's a great idea, truly. Scale your gluten to meet the % you want for your flour. A more liquid starter will favour higher *bacterial* activity, giving a sharper taste. Balance this against how the acid produced by these bacteria will start to degrade your gluten structure, so keep an eye on your fermentation. The beauty of the stiffer starter is that the lower hydration favours the yeasts instead, giving terrific raising and longer tolerance for fermentation time before the gluten degrades. Keep watching his videos and you will eventually get all the answers you're after
😂 I love your videos. I have made my "sausage" today and looking forward to the result. After 3 days of feeding, do we go back to 1:1 ratio water/flour??
Hendrik bought a a fast new lens. Look at the out of focus background. Is this an f1.4 lens? I have to have the super sour tang, so I won't be using a stiff starter.
i use a 100% hydration starter. After feeding i wait for it to double before I use it. With the stiff starter (50% hydration) you said we should wait until we see air pockets at the bottom of the jar. Does this mean the starter will not "double" in size? I live in Sweden and I can only find flour at 11-12% protein. I hope this stiff starter will help
Great question. It won't necessarily double in size (it depends on your flour). Even with your 100% starter I would more look at the bubbles rather than the size increase. Same problem in Germany. For the default supermarket in the northern countries the stiff starter for wheat bread seems the best choice.
I have a stiff starter aka lievito Madre and I can say it is an amazing starter! It is ready for bread making after even 4 hours! Although I like to wait til 6-7 hours. What I love about it is it's not sour and can be used in sweet doughs also.
I tried this out and it like exploded out of my bowl it was so bubbly. I just took a little starter from my main jar, mixed it with the ratios here put it in a little bowl and used the entire lump as my levain and WOW.
I've been experimenting with a way to get more Oven Spring Using a DO. After multiply trials, this works very well !! Before preheating DO, pour boiling water in half way up sides. Cover and place in oven @ 500°F. After 1 hr, carefully pour the water out but leave the insides wet. Place the dough inside and bake as usual. You get a very steamy environment with the water added prior to preheating, and then discarded and leaving water vapor behind before baking. Results are very similar to the Rofco and Anova Bread ovens which bake with injected steam.
I made the stiff starter and it came out great and made your "best sourdough sandwich bread" with it. The bread came out beautifully but I found it a little difficult to get the stiff starter completely incorporated into the autolysis. Maybe i need to only use the stiff starter with recipes that allow me to soften the stiff starter in the water before adding flour.
@The Bread Code - okay, I have now indulged almost all of your videos - „80 % content-hydration” - in juste a couiple of days. I must way, greatness! However, also a bit confusing: First the perfect starter video, then: convert to liquid; then: convert to stiff! What is your to-go for fluffy loafs nowadays? And also: Did you mean in the video at 8:00, that for more tang, you ONLY have to use flour with higher protein %, or did you mean higher protein PLUS more liquid starter? (Can you combine stiff and liquid)? Side note: Have you tried the flours from Biomühle Eiling, the 550 and the Backstarke are really delicious, taste-wise. Best greetings from Bremen
I just made my first loaf with the stiff starter and I love it. How do you convert the use of a stiff starter into other recipes that call for a regular 10% hydration starter?
Lovely. Can you show us more on how to maintain the stiff starter if need to bake 2 to 3 times a week? Besides, what is the different between stiff starter and pasta madre? I watched some ppl water bath the starter, score the starter...
Hey Gan, they are the same as far as I can tell. Water bath I think is overrated. I tested it once and couldn't see a major difference. When you bake 2-3 times per week, you might want to consider leaving your starter at room temperature the whole time. Consider feeding it once every 24 hours. I typically use 5g starter, 50g flour, 25g water. This depends on how much starter you need. Hope this makes sense.
Have you ever experienced with amylase and protease to affect loft and softness. Turns out protease is commonly available (Adolf's meat tenderizer). Amylase needs to be ordered. Can't use much though or it turns into soup.
Very interesting. I've had this issue when baking with whole wheat flour. It proportionally contains more enzymes compared to the weight. That's why I ran into issues of overfermentation much faster.
Apologies if you've covered this in another video, but i was wondering how many days of shifting to a liquid starter it takes in general to sufficiently select for those lactic acid bacteria? Also after re-adjusting to a stiff starter, do you ever find you need to tame the vinegar-like bacteria back down afain by doing another phase of liquid starter?
I use the Sourdough Journey Chart to estimate the target rise for my 100% hydration starter. With a stiff starter can you still follow the same percentage rise rules with the dough temp? For example, if dough is 75 degrees, you aim for a 50% rise, 80 degrees 30% rise and so forth.
Great yes that works. Don't look too much at the size increase of the sourdough starter. You want to smell it and look at pockets of air on the edge of your container.
Unfortunately I already fed my 100% hydration sour dough starters so I will have to wait until tomorrow to transition one of them into a stiff one, thank you so much for this educational video!
I'm a bit confused with how to use my stiff starter. Do I need to feed it just like my other starter 6 to 8 hours ago and then start maxing my main dough?
What I understood is that use 10g of starter which I already have(100% hydration, not 500%), add 25g of water and 50g of flour. Feed 25g of water and 50g of flour. Is it right? I just want to make sure because I'm not a native English speaker. Or do I have to use 10g of starter from 500% hydration first?? I've read your blog though..
Thanks! Correct. The idea is to make a starter that is relatively stiff (50-60%) hydration. The 500% hydration starter will help you to achieve more dairy notes. But it is not required.
Hey! I love what you are doing here! I have a question: Do you adapt the water content when baking with a stiff starter? I mean, are you increasing the water content in your recipe to compensate the lower water content in the stiff starter or not?
Good point. But typically I don't so much. Because it will just change the water % a little bit. It's more important with the stiff starter. The past weeks I am baking with super low hydration (60%), trying to make great baguettes. It works nice and they even have a fluffy open crumb!
@@the_bread_code Okay, i calculated a stiff starter and a regular one (100%) for my basic bread recipe and the difference in hydration was 5%. With a regular starter I achieve around 70% hydration, with the stiff starter just 65%. I use around 75g starter per bread (total amount of flour is 375g - without the flour of the starter). I thought that the lower amount of water makes it easier to bake sourdough bread - probably that is the reason why you can use cheap flour if baking with a stiff starter. Most of the times I also get better oven spring by reducing the water - so maybe with using a stiff starter you don't overload your flour that much with water and that increases also the oven spring? Great! I hope you will show us a video of these baguettes :)
I'm new at making sourdough bread, but since the start i don't know why but I have always used the stiff starter, and I like it a lot, and since a like a more mild bread and I don't have easy access to really good flour it's a win win
Just wrote a blog on the topic. I hope it helps: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2021/10/24/all-you-need-to-know-stiff-liquid-regular-starter.html. The left overs I store in a jar and use them to make sourdough spice or a discard loaf.
@@pkh2833 Try this: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2020/12/22/the-last-sourdough-recipe.html. Just replace the starter with a stiff starter. Aim for doubling in size. It will do the trick!
You can read about this in detail in my free book called “The Sourdough Framework”. You can get it here: breadco.de/book. You can support the project with a donation, but there is absolutely no knead. I believe information like this should be free and accessible to everyone. The book is made for everyone who wants to understand the important details when making sourdough bread. Thank you!
did you know, that the active yeast in a panetonne is as well 100 flour to 50 gr water.
Thank Yoú. Just downloaded the book, for free!. Great stuff. 👍🏼 from a novice sourdough baker.
The best starter I have ever made was from the small piece of dough from the day before. It never grew in the little jar, but it turned into a wonderful active starter.
This is actually the same method my great grandmother used over 80 years ago. She took a piece of dough and kept it under flour until the following week. She baked 12 loaves at once for the whole week
One warning and note, after converting your starter into liquid starter you will permanently change your starter's microorganisms. I couldn't get back the acetic vinegary notes. This vinegary flavour is excellent though in case you are making rye bread for instance. So please keep this in mind and also make a backup. Also another note, some people who make the starter initially from fruit water never get the vinegary notes at all. It's fascinating and just shows one more time how unique every sourdough starter is. Sank you.
Edit: Had fun with my new camera 🤣. What do you think? What can I improve?
Edit 2: I also just wrote down the key differences of all the starters in my blog post. I hope it helps: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2021/10/24/all-you-need-to-know-stiff-liquid-regular-starter.html
Would the extra adult balloon filling of the stiffer starter not be because there is more “fuel” with more flour? The available carbohydrates that can be decomposed into CO2 is much higher than a liquid starter even if it is a activity highway.
Honestly, your new camera is too good. The bokeh is so strong it makes you look like a cartoon character. But it is great for filming the starter and dough and bread, basically anything on the counter. Just not your face ☹️. Sorry to say.
Yeah, I felt like it was almost like a green screen. The depth of field is very weird, either 100% or 0% blur.
I would like more silly German jokes and craziness please. Especially the scary voices. Very entertaining. I think it would be great to hear you speak in whatever voice you think the bread might be making or perhaps the micro organisms and wild yeasts. That would be such fun.
@@thaejsooriya3313 Great point! I accounted for that in the experiment. Each of them had the same amount of fuel.
The best solution ever! I was tired to maintain a liquid starter and also the waste of flour it’s insane.!. I decided to give a try to the stiff starter and my relationship with sourdough starter changed for good.
The Bread Code is the best resource to learn about sourdough.
Danke schön!
Do you put it in the freezer or fridge?? And how often you feed it? Thankyou
I will be trying a stiff starter. My dad made sour dough bread all my life. I can't believe we never talked about it because I took it so for granted. He was a cook for the sheepherders in northern Arizona and New Mexico for 17 years so he had cooking out in the country down to an art everything was cooked underground in cast iron. I so regret not asking more questions because those secrets are gone from me forever. I've been working with sourdough for about 3 months now and have only had a couple of successes. My starter's name is Pedro, in other words, Peter Pan, pan is the Spanish word for bread and Pedro is the Spanish word for peter, thus Pedro.🤓
Hey Ernie! How’s the bread coming along?? Your story is sad and educational. I hope your dad is looking down to zap that bread into a great loaf!
That would have been right up my ally to experience and see his cooking that way. Many primitive ways of cooking is so interesting. And different cultures cont. with that tradition passing it down generation to generation.
I would really like to talk to you mu husbands family is from young and I've heard alot about the Pleasant Valley War
Oh your dad must have had wonderful stories to tell and great cooking ideas! I am in the same position - my dad was Italian, grew up in the countryside and knew how to make everything and stupid here did not learn from him and now it is too late. Still we were lucky to have interesting fathers!
I come from a long line of German bakers(and millers (the house in which the bakery was is from 1150 and our mill is even older) and love bread. I lived in Paris and Spain and always found the best bakers. Your explanations are extremely good and I hope many people get convinced to make their own bread. One thing: in the States 99% of the flower is bromated. That is illegal in the rest of the world because it is cancerous. I recommend King Arthur flours: never bromated, never bleached. They have fantastic flours (I use the super high protein Lancelot) and you will find better flour only in France (and spelt in Germany). The cheap flour here in the US is actually harmful. Your "stiff" starter is like pasta madre. I recommend Ian Spampatti's channel to all bread lovers.
I have two starters one is regular sour starter and the other has no sourness at all and i use them together 50/50. So it's fluffy and tasty. And i can increase one of them to have either more sourness or less.
This is a brilliant idea! Thank you for the suggestion.
Wow
I would think you can mix the dry starter with fresh water and flour the day before to get the tang
How did you get the sourless one?
What is the no sourness starter? How do you make that? Do you do this stiff starter for no sourness? How often do you feed it and maintain it to be no-sour?
Henrick, I've been following your journey for the past year, and I love how you have run the complete gambit from super watery to this new stiff starter method. For a lazy guy, you've achieved a Sourdough knowledge anthology! Thank you!
Thank you very much 🤗. It depends on what bread I am trying to bake. With my super expensive flour I can use the liquid starter, with the default one the stiff starter seems to work a bit better.
This really works!! One of my regular customers texted me saying that my "other" bread was "like steak" (and she loved it), but this week's bread made with the stiff starter was lighter "like bread", she said. My kitchen here in central Texas is quite warm, so not sure if it was due to the ambient temp or the starter, but it proofed fast and resulted in a super light dough.
I made 2 loafs, one with my regular starter and the other with my first stiff starter. I did the stiff first, I kept your basic recipe as close as I could, 80% hydration using white bread flour and whole wheat BF. The day was hot, 77 (25) in the house, very unusual for April in upstate NY. They both fermented nicely with the regular sourdough inflating more than the stiff even though it was started an hour later. The most surprising thing is the ph of the stiff was much lower at time of baking, 4.05 vs 4.2. The spring was great, but I bungled the scoring on the regular starter loaf, so it isn't very symmetrical.
Thanks for all the experiments you do! I usually make 2 loaves at a time since my oven will fit 2 dutch ovens so I can do my own experiments. I've started half baking one loaf and leave it in the fridge until I need it. It works great.
Tried the stiff starter and loved it!
The result was way more spring than my regular sourdough method and it was much easier to work with as it was not at all sticky.
Thank you very much.
Great to hear!
Thanks!
Macht echt Freude, soviel Wissen mit so einer großen Portion Humor zu sehen. Echt cool.
Danke 🤣👍
I gave up making sourdough bread in the past because it came out flat. Now I know why😃😃. Thank you for sharing this knowledge. Right now, I am on day one of stiff starter process. Wish me luck!!!
Dear Hendrick, so glad I came across you channel. The level of detail, the experiments, the clear step by step instruction and the humor make your channel exceptional. Thank you so much for all your hard work
I actually started to use the stiff starter from when I first watched your yeast vs sour vs mild video and i super love my bread ever since! The tang that it gives is really right for me. I dont personally like too sour bread and it's especially hard before since it's easy to mess up the fermentation when living in a hotter climate. Using the stiff starter is truly a game changer! (I super love your videos and Ive probably watched your videos at least 10 times per video for reference 😂) Much love and greetings from singapore!
Haha awesome! Thank you. Also love your comment as it shows how much this all ultimately boils down to personal preference. To the others, this video doesn't mean this is the best option, it's just another alternative. Sometimes it's a little hard to put that all in one video 🤣
Hello Random stranger from Singapore, greetings from Ireland. I love Singapore and think of it often.
Recently found your channel! As an electrical engineer , finding relaxation with bread- making in my kitchen, I absolutely luv your analytical style! Thanks to all your pointers I am finally seeing some success with rise and crumb, thank you so much! You are a terrific teacher. THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!!
I knew I shared many things in common with my many Germans friends , my Leica, my Eurasier puppy, and now its my sourdough! Hooked on your channel- keep up your great work! Cheers!👍🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦
Hahah, thank you very much!
I just want to say I love watching your videos and enjoy all the information you provide! I just started my sourdough journey back in January this year and it blows my mind at how much I'm still learning about the whole process! I'm very intrigued by the stiff starter and am probably going to start converting some of my 100% hydration starter into a stiff starter tonight to start experimenting with it! Thank you for all the research you've done (along with your experiments) and for sharing it with us!
Thanks for all your tips! New baker here and it is mind boggling at all the information! 🤯
Love your videos. A couple of thoughts to thank you. Hope they prove of interest and value. 1. When scoring proofed bread prior to baking - dip the sharp thin blade in olive oil to lubricate it. It reduces the potential of tearing the dough. 2. Try short autolysis times - 1 to 30 minutes. Less destruction of gluten network, more improved taste than longer times.
I'm still experimenting with my stiff starter, and it has been a good experience so far! My last sourdough burger buns with stiff starter turned out incredible. They exploded in size after shaping. I never had such huge fluffy and delicious buns. I'm looking forward to my next bake, which I think might be the recipe in this video. Thank you and may the gluten be with you 😘
Hi, how long did it take you to create your stiff starter before it was ready to use?
I used to experiment with low hydration starters as well. What I noticed is that they (at least for me) ran bad much quicker than 100% hydration starters. And as I sometimes leave my starters in the fridge for more than a month without feeding them the 100% hydration works much better for me. Never had any mold issues or bad smell with these. Probably because they are more sour I suppose.
Thanks for this video.
I live in the bush in west Australia and it’s summertime now so my kitchen which is outside ranges from mid 20c overnight to upwards of 40c during the day.
I agonised over failure after failure trying to create good crumb until I started to think about this yeast and bacteria balance. At last I’m making reasonable sourdough. With the info in this video I can feel greater success coming.
By the way the dogs are quite happy with a bit of the gooey sour pancake bread. And the worms in my worm farm love it. 🙄
Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, experience and wisdom! I have been banging my head against that wall with trying to figure out why my dough is so sticky!! God Bless you!!
I made a small loaf from a stiff starter and it turns out fluffy and delicious I don’t have a strong starter yet (mine is 2 weeks old) and all my bast loafs was failed so I think I’ll just stick to the stiff starter for now thank you so much (excuse my weak english)
This really works! I just produced a fluffy loaf with lots of flavour.
If you need a break from the slightly gummy texture of SD, this is the answer.
Love it!
I’m so happy I found your site! Thank you for sharing your knowledge! Plus I appreciate your sense of humor! 😊
Switched my starter from 100% hydration rye to 50% KA bread flour. Didn’t make liquid starter step. Baked 3 times with the stiff starter, great results. Flavor is not sour at all. Stupendous oven spring!
Once again, amazing video my friend! I love how you're a German guy, making videos in English and your UA-cam is in Spanish! Cheers from Brazil.
😂 😂 😂
As a newbie, my first starters were either watery or at least thin. The results were hockey pucks. Even before I saw this video I started experimenting with thicker starter... not as thick as yours, however. The thicker starter (it hardly wants to come out of the jar!) resulted in more proofing and oven spring (by the way, I live at 4,300 ft elevation). So I know that you are on the right track for me! Thanks for the video!
Ah! Now I understand why my new starter works so well. It's stiffer than my previous one. It doesn't stick (yeah!), and has an excellent rise. And so yummy.
Love this! I myself stick with a 100% hydration starter, simply because I don’t want to choose between oven spring and sourness 😋
wow an excellent experiment. my previous starter died from neglect. beginning a new one so challenging 😢. but I want more yeast than bacteria so am following your Stiff Starter method. D1 results impressive, now into D2.
Here in MY really difficult to find 15%hp flour so am waiting to see how this SS improves texture n taste of d 11%hp dough.
Thanks so much for all yr bread engineering journey, can't find a more useful site than yours, keep up d good work Henrick 👍
Hydration winter: 300g water +80g starter that contains 33,3 % water makes about 326g water to 400g flour: Dough hydration = 81,5% which is quite wet with the flour I use….so it may be a stiff starter but a wet dough?
(Summer recepe is around 78,5%)
It took a couple of seconds for me to realize you said "adult balloons". 🙂 Thank you for explaining everything so well and differently from other videos I have watched that were more basic that didn't go into the different ways of hydrating your starter. I have struggled over the years making sourdough .... I usually get very dense bread. I will give your method a try.
Loved this video!
Glad you liked it!!
LMAO. Thanks for this video. I have always used a thin starter, but I was living in California where temps were always moderate to warm. Now that I’m in Maine, my starter has been soo sad! 😢 I actually started increasing the flour at feeding instinctually, but I’m happy to hear that I’m on the right track. I may get this SOURDOUGH ART yet. ❤
I have been baking with this method for a while now. Stiff starter made of 100% wheat whole grain, baking 80% white flour/20% whole grain breads. I use good flour and all, but lately my fermentations have been quite weak. Not as much gas production and mediocre oven spring. Not sure what it is, i feed it at least twice from the fridge before use. I will try out the doubled amount of starter in the recipe.
In the coming days i will test, if you can store the stiff starter in a freezer and use it directly for standard recipes. I'd have several 10 g balls of stiff starter in the freezer. For each bake, take one ball, thaw it, feed it twice over 24 h at 1:1:2 (10+10+20 = 40 g; 40+40+80 = 160 g, or ~100 g of flour) and put everything into a standard recipe for a 500 g flour bread.
Some bakers used to store their stiff starter in the bag of flour
I'm from Costa Rica and love to learn from you. All I really understood about sourdough is thanks to you.
I use Lievito Madre (Stiff/ Mother Dough) for all my breads since last year. This look like Lievito Madre minus the sugar water bath method. Tq for sharing Hendrik ❤
I feed my starter twice a day at 100% hydration. I will definitely be trying out the stiff starter for a bit.
The local flour we have in PR doesn't really work for breads above 65%, and I supplement with vital gluten to achieve that.
Still, I've been baking daily for over two years now! It's really interesting to keep learning more about it!
Thanks Hendrik. I have experimented with a stiff starter for 2 months or so. I have had moderate, but not the "kaboom whay hey look at my bread, folks" sucess as with my 100 pc hydration starter. I find I have to pay attention to the fermentation more, and it is in danger of over fermenting, even with only 50pc expansion in bulk rise, with 12 percent protien.
Going to try the stiff starter, thank you! Just wondering though, the bread with the stuff starter be less better for you gut health wise? Great video x
Love from a new subscriber! I’m so enjoying your content and learning a TON about baking bread and raising starters.
I traveled around Germany about 20 years ago and just loved the country and the people. I miss it!
Gluten tag!!
hahaha... my day... so many surprises in this video. Good one!
I have let the starter sit in the fridge for months with only one feeding after 3 months. It still works even with this starvation timing
I pretty much decided to give up baking sourdough because all I could make flat sour pancakes. You have given me hope! I will try this method.
Fascinating!
Do you just keep feeding 1-1-2 everyday until you decide to bake? Then this “stiff” starter is used in the leaven?
Thank you for any helpful comments 😊
Just love the monthztztz. English is also a second language for me and that is always one of the difficult ones, like schedule and sheets. (I still wouldn't say the last one in front of young children! 😅)
Thank you so much for this video. All those different starters and uses for them can be very confusing.
I'm going to try the sausage for me next bake. 😊
I jus say linenihave trouble. With allot of words like sheep ships and sip is all the same to me.
Hallo Hendrik, great new look with the camera, love the zoom ins and the jump cuts. Keep the great videos and recipes coming…. Danke
Oddly enough, I have been doing this myself since the summer completely independently. I prefer it!
from my previous comments you know how much we love you...two things to point out 1. when you do create your stiff sourdough starter you did not mention when it'll be ready to use for mixing my bread dough, is it immediately, do you have to wait till it reaches a certain ph or size increase or what, forgive me but I am a little confused...2. you said afterwards we'll have a little sourdough left and you suggested to put it in the fridge, alas your video show the freezer opening and closing to store your starter, well? Freezer or fridge? and what difference can you expect in either case? thank you
I would recommend to look on the edges of the container and check for some bubbles. That's a sign it's ready to be used! Also use your nose, it should have a great scent to it. Fridge if you want to bake in the next 7 days. Freezer for long term storage. Your microbes will sporulate and then become activated again when you add water and flour again.
Great, succinct summary of so much good bread teaching. This video is a bit too slapstick for my taste, but I am glad you are having fun!! ❤️🍞 ❤️
I've never tried a stiff starter before...today is the day I try! Thanks for the tips 😁🍞
Hello!
Last year I purchased an old copy of Arizona Recipes from a thrift store. One of the sourdough starters used soured milk and flour. I'm both lactose and gluten intolerant, but decided to give it a try. I'm using whole rye flour and, instead of milk, I used the whey milk left over from making raw cream butter. Ironically, I have a tolerance for raw milk and cream...
I'll let you know the results. The starter is still very new, but very tangy, like I like it!
Hey Jaki. Oh noes! In that case please try making a liquid starter. And - please try using ancient grains such as Einkorn. Let it ferment for a long time and then store it in a loaf pan. Wait for it to increase in size again then bake it. This way you will have as little gluten left as possible. Only take a tiny bite to see how it impacts you. The key is really to have a very long fermentation.
@@the_bread_code
Thank you!
I have 4 starters going:
Stiff. 50/50 rye flour and spring water.
Liquid: 50/250 rye and water
Milk: 50/50 rye and soured milk
The last is a combination of water and milk with the rye.
They all taste different. Favorites so far for flavor are the liquid and the milk ones.
I'll try to find einkorn flour. My local healthfood store can order I it for me.
Thank you again!👍
Wow, I loved when I got my starter going, but neither my wife nor me are into the vinegary notes or too sour flavors, so I´m currently switching to liquid starter and in a couple of weeks switching to stiff, so looking forward to see and taste the results.. Thank you for the tips
Please let me know how it goes. Good luck!
@@the_bread_code I finally finished going from regular to liquid to stiff and yeah, is just like you said, you need to check how the smell changes, but in the third day after switching to stiff the starter more than doubles once fed, and the bread is really soft and even fluffier than if you use regular dry yeast. Lovely oven spring considering I only cover it with a steel bowl since I don't have a dutch oven yet and it still has some acidity but not excessive and no longer tastes vinegary, my wife loved it. Oh, and it tastes incredible with Nutella (hope I don't wrath the bread gods hehe). Thank you so much.
@@richardmh1987 did you do the liquid for one day then to stiff for three days?
Henrick, I'll admit after watching the video and making it, I was still very sceptical. After all, how could such a stiff blob of dough actually do anything other than just sit there like... a blob? Well, I wouldn't have believed it. After trying it, not only did it produce the desired activity, but it produced the best sourdough ever, with a perfect rise and ear.... Thanks!
😂 that's awesome. My pleasure.
Hi, thank you for your videos! Can you tell me how to make a stiff starter from the very beginning without a regular starter? Or in any case I need to convert my regular starter for it? I'm new in sourdough making))
Hilarious! Love it. Thanks.
Thank you so much for sharing all of this great info! I have learned so much from watching your channel. I am new to sourdough and am finally starting to get some decent/edible results lol
i thought the stiff starter was interesting. so i tried coverting my sourdough to the stiff starter. the first day was fine (10 g my starter, 25 g water, 50 g flour) left at room temperature. i doubled no problem. day 2 -- 10 g starter, 25 g water, 50 g flour -- put into fridge after feeding. day 3 -- disaster -- the starter was so stiff i had to pinch out the 10 g starter, added the 25 g water and can't get the 2 to mix, the starter refused to dissolve! what did i do wrong?
Henrick, I LOVE your videos, and I'm making my first stiff starter. Two questions:
1. My regular starter was made with all-purpose flour, but I did my first feeding of the stiff starter with bread flour. I do want a more sour dough. Was that okay?
2. Can I put the discard from the stiff starter into my jar of regular discard? I use my discard in other recipes (i.e. brownies, pancakes, etc.).
Thank you for all your great information.
By the way, if you had a t-shirt with a large design or logo on the front, I'd buy one.
You didn't respond to my question, hope you see it, realize you're busy, but do you ever add gluten powder directly to your flower to boost the protein? I am unable to find very high protein flour in bulk where I live, and was thinking of buying wheat gluten and adding it to my flower.
That's a great idea, truly.
Scale your gluten to meet the % you want for your flour.
A more liquid starter will favour higher *bacterial* activity, giving a sharper taste. Balance this against how the acid produced by these bacteria will start to degrade your gluten structure, so keep an eye on your fermentation.
The beauty of the stiffer starter is that the lower hydration favours the yeasts instead, giving terrific raising and longer tolerance for fermentation time before the gluten degrades.
Keep watching his videos and you will eventually get all the answers you're after
😂 I love your videos. I have made my "sausage" today and looking forward to the result. After 3 days of feeding, do we go back to 1:1 ratio water/flour??
Hendrik bought a a fast new lens. Look at the out of focus background. Is this an f1.4 lens? I have to have the super sour tang, so I won't be using a stiff starter.
Hahah, thank you. It's a canon 50mm RF 1.2. I treated myself LOL. Any recommendations? Some have said that the bokeh is too much.
@@the_bread_code Wow, f1.2 is a very fast lens! I think the bokeh looks great.
Do we still do stretch and folds when using a stiff starter?
The editing! 🤣
Great job! (I haven't finished yet but geez the editing was hilarious!)
Sanks!
hello from The Bahamas. Will give this a try!
Now I need to learn how to bulk up for large orders like 60-80 loaves of bread. I’m still learning about stiff starters.
Hallo aus Amerika! I will be this video is great, I look forward to trying this out. I will definitely be following your videos.
i use a 100% hydration starter. After feeding i wait for it to double before I use it. With the stiff starter (50% hydration) you said we should wait until we see air pockets at the bottom of the jar. Does this mean the starter will not "double" in size?
I live in Sweden and I can only find flour at 11-12% protein. I hope this stiff starter will help
My stiff starter doubles easily in size before it's ready, so still think you can go for that.
Great question. It won't necessarily double in size (it depends on your flour). Even with your 100% starter I would more look at the bubbles rather than the size increase. Same problem in Germany. For the default supermarket in the northern countries the stiff starter for wheat bread seems the best choice.
I have a stiff starter aka lievito Madre and I can say it is an amazing starter! It is ready for bread making after even 4 hours! Although I like to wait til 6-7 hours. What I love about it is it's not sour and can be used in sweet doughs also.
I tried this out and it like exploded out of my bowl it was so bubbly. I just took a little starter from my main jar, mixed it with the ratios here put it in a little bowl and used the entire lump as my levain and WOW.
😍
How am I storaging stiff starter if I don’t want to bake for example 5 days?
I've been experimenting with a way to get more Oven Spring Using a DO. After multiply trials, this works very well !!
Before preheating DO, pour boiling water in half way up sides. Cover and place in oven @ 500°F. After 1 hr, carefully pour the water out but leave the insides wet. Place the dough inside and bake as usual. You get a very steamy environment with the water added prior to preheating, and then discarded and leaving water vapor behind before baking. Results are very similar to the Rofco and Anova Bread ovens which bake with injected steam.
What do you think about the concept of using the aliquot as the basis for the next weeks starter? I am trying to have less waste.
Totally works 👍👍👍
I made the stiff starter and it came out great and made your "best sourdough sandwich bread" with it. The bread came out beautifully but I found it a little difficult to get the stiff starter completely incorporated into the autolysis. Maybe i need to only use the stiff starter with recipes that allow me to soften the stiff starter in the water before adding flour.
WTF!!?? A German with humor? 🤣🤣I really love your chanel, I have learned a lot about baking. Keep up the good work!
@The Bread Code - okay, I have now indulged almost all of your videos - „80 % content-hydration” - in juste a couiple of days. I must way, greatness! However, also a bit confusing: First the perfect starter video, then: convert to liquid; then: convert to stiff! What is your to-go for fluffy loafs nowadays?
And also: Did you mean in the video at 8:00, that for more tang, you ONLY have to use flour with higher protein %, or did you mean higher protein PLUS more liquid starter? (Can you combine stiff and liquid)?
Side note: Have you tried the flours from Biomühle Eiling, the 550 and the Backstarke are really delicious, taste-wise. Best greetings from Bremen
I just made my first loaf with the stiff starter and I love it. How do you convert the use of a stiff starter into other recipes that call for a regular 10% hydration starter?
Hendrik You are funny and you make watching you fun i love it
Wondering about using half stiff starter and half liquid starter to keep tanginess - what do you think?
Lovely.
Can you show us more on how to maintain the stiff starter if need to bake 2 to 3 times a week?
Besides, what is the different between stiff starter and pasta madre? I watched some ppl water bath the starter, score the starter...
Hey Gan, they are the same as far as I can tell. Water bath I think is overrated. I tested it once and couldn't see a major difference. When you bake 2-3 times per week, you might want to consider leaving your starter at room temperature the whole time. Consider feeding it once every 24 hours. I typically use 5g starter, 50g flour, 25g water. This depends on how much starter you need. Hope this makes sense.
Have you ever experienced with amylase and protease to affect loft and softness. Turns out protease is commonly available (Adolf's meat tenderizer). Amylase needs to be ordered. Can't use much though or it turns into soup.
Very interesting. I've had this issue when baking with whole wheat flour. It proportionally contains more enzymes compared to the weight. That's why I ran into issues of overfermentation much faster.
Apologies if you've covered this in another video, but i was wondering how many days of shifting to a liquid starter it takes in general to sufficiently select for those lactic acid bacteria? Also after re-adjusting to a stiff starter, do you ever find you need to tame the vinegar-like bacteria back down afain by doing another phase of liquid starter?
I use the Sourdough Journey Chart to estimate the target rise for my 100% hydration starter. With a stiff starter can you still follow the same percentage rise rules with the dough temp? For example, if dough is 75 degrees, you aim for a 50% rise, 80 degrees 30% rise and so forth.
Great yes that works. Don't look too much at the size increase of the sourdough starter. You want to smell it and look at pockets of air on the edge of your container.
Your funniest video :) i love your sense of humour :)
Unfortunately I already fed my 100% hydration sour dough starters so I will have to wait until tomorrow to transition one of them into a stiff one, thank you so much for this educational video!
I'm a bit confused with how to use my stiff starter. Do I need to feed it just like my other starter 6 to 8 hours ago and then start maxing my main dough?
Yes! Just like your regular starter.
What I understood is that use 10g of starter which I already have(100% hydration, not 500%), add 25g of water and 50g of flour. Feed 25g of water and 50g of flour. Is it right? I just want to make sure because I'm not a native English speaker. Or do I have to use 10g of starter from 500% hydration first?? I've read your blog though..
Thanks! Correct. The idea is to make a starter that is relatively stiff (50-60%) hydration. The 500% hydration starter will help you to achieve more dairy notes. But it is not required.
Hey! I love what you are doing here! I have a question: Do you adapt the water content when baking with a stiff starter? I mean, are you increasing the water content in your recipe to compensate the lower water content in the stiff starter or not?
Good point. But typically I don't so much. Because it will just change the water % a little bit. It's more important with the stiff starter. The past weeks I am baking with super low hydration (60%), trying to make great baguettes. It works nice and they even have a fluffy open crumb!
@@the_bread_code Okay, i calculated a stiff starter and a regular one (100%) for my basic bread recipe and the difference in hydration was 5%. With a regular starter I achieve around 70% hydration, with the stiff starter just 65%. I use around 75g starter per bread (total amount of flour is 375g - without the flour of the starter). I thought that the lower amount of water makes it easier to bake sourdough bread - probably that is the reason why you can use cheap flour if baking with a stiff starter. Most of the times I also get better oven spring by reducing the water - so maybe with using a stiff starter you don't overload your flour that much with water and that increases also the oven spring?
Great! I hope you will show us a video of these baguettes :)
@@o.p.8328 Yes! But most important is that your gluten won't rot as quickly as you have more yeast fermentation.
@@the_bread_code Ok, thank you!
I'm new at making sourdough bread, but since the start i don't know why but I have always used the stiff starter, and I like it a lot, and since a like a more mild bread and I don't have easy access to really good flour it's a win win
Great combination of information and wit
VERY interesting...thank you!
Wow, Pun-O-Rama... always good to laugh. Neat idea, going to try it for travel.
Please explain for a nubby. When you say feed the stiff starter for 3days, what are the proportions of flour and water?
That would be 100g of flour, 60g of water for instance.
Thank You for the simple explanation.
How do you feed your stiff starter? You keep taking ten grams each day ? What do you do with the left over??
Just wrote a blog on the topic. I hope it helps: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2021/10/24/all-you-need-to-know-stiff-liquid-regular-starter.html. The left overs I store in a jar and use them to make sourdough spice or a discard loaf.
Love this technique. Gonna try it!
when you said put the starter in the fig for up to months. Did you put it in the Freezer section?
Hendrick you are so funny! Still laughing and thanks for your videos. Is it better to do the stiff starter for summer?
Haha, thanks! It depends on which flavour you like and which flour you have at hand I would say.
Where is your written recipe using the stiff starter please? Is it the same percentages as for the usual? Want to give it a go!
@@pkh2833 Try this: blog.the-bread-code.io/recipe/2020/12/22/the-last-sourdough-recipe.html. Just replace the starter with a stiff starter. Aim for doubling in size. It will do the trick!