So, how long do I wait for this bread to rise if it's just sitting there laughing at me?

The starter looked right and smelled nice and sour and not like gin.

I was careful with the yeast when mixing the dough.

The dough felt right.

It didn't rise although it might have swollen. :rofl:

After the first non-rise, I took it out, punched what would have been down had there been an up, felt it up for a while, lol, formed it into pretty loaves and put it back on the pan in the oven.

We're not speaking right now but I haven't given up on the relationship. :silly:

I've had my bread be stubborn when my kitchen was too cold (or in Phoenix, too hot)

bread is like Goldilocks, it will only play nice with 'just right'

:rofl:

to thaw me.

So far, I'm not taking it personally. lol

You're working with a sourdough starter, is that correct?

By "activate", I mean when you fed it and allowed it to double (at which point it's "fully activated") prior to mixing it into your bread dough?

The reason it's important to activate a starter until double in volume before mixing it into your dough is that a starter can't rise a loaf of bread dough any more than it can rise itself.

Forgive me if I'm making an incorrect assumption here, it's certainly possible that some other factors are at fault. How familiar are you with sourdough and with breadmaking in general? Can you give me a little information about what your recipe and process were in making the bread?

It's my first batch and no, it didn't double. It bubbled nicely but I was only giving it 1T of flour and water per day.

Maybe the poor thing is just trying to do its best under the circumstances?

:rofl:

There are starters that are used just for adding some flavoring to a bread leavened with baker's yeast and then there are starters that are used to actually leaven AND flavor the bread. What you have going will add some flavor to bread, but it won't leaven a bread dough on its own - your yeast just isn't strong and vibrant enough.

A true sourdough starter that will leaven and flavor bread on its own is a combination of yeast and lactobacilli. In a sourdough starter the yeast provides the rise while the lactobacilli provide the flavor (not 100% true, but mostly). But the yeast in a true sourdough starter is a slighty different strain of yeast from what we all buy - because the normal bread yeast that we use can't survive the acidic conditions of a sourdough starter that is created by the lactobacilli. I sourdough starter can be started without the use of baker's yeast because the microbes need to create a starter are availalbe on the flour, and the culture that forms over a period of days nurtures viable strains of yeast and lactobacilli. If you use bakers yeast to start up a starter, the starter will needsto go through a transformation in order for the correct strains of yeast to "fight it out" with the bakers yeast so that the starter can be sustained.

Back in the early days of the internet I ran a bread forum online and posted a lot of information about starting and maintaining a sourdough starter. You can find that information here http://www.angelfire.com/ab/bethsbread/sdMenu.html if you are interested in checking it out. I was a little bit more of a purist in those days than I am now, but there is a lot of information there that can be valuable to you.

Sourdough is a journey and a learning experience. Congrats to you for wanting to make the best bread that you possibly can for yourself and your family. There's nothing like sourdough! It IS possible for the home baker to make great sourdough at home, there's just of learning and experimentation ahead. I'm happy to try to help... PM me or post here and I'll get back to you. I'll bet we can get your Zool happy, strong and vibrant enough to make some great bread for you within a few days.

3/4 c ea flour, warm water, Zool probably had the best meal ever yesterday. And he's out of the refrigerator for now. I'll go read and see what you were up to. I went ahead and baked the poor little loaves anyway to see what would show up. The texture and flavor and even tension isn't bad at all -- they just never rose. The scent of fresh sourdough is just about killing all of us here, so I better get to work. :)

housewolf rocks on breads! And is such a huge and generous advisor. :hi:

And housewolf's instructions, tips and considerations are much more clearly written than most of the material I've found.

:hi:

She has a passion for it and is wonderful at sharing. Good luck! :hi:

* 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
* 2 cups warm water
* 2 cups all-purpose flour

Directions

1. In large non-metallic bowl, mix together dry yeast, 2 cups warm water, and 2 cups all purpose flour and cover loosely.
2. Leave in a warm place to ferment, 4 to 8 days. Depending on temperature and humidity of kitchen, times may vary. Place on cookie sheet in case of overflow. Check on occasionally.
3. When mixture is bubbly and has a pleasant sour smell, it is ready to use. If mixture has a pink, orange, or any other strange color tinge to it, THROW IT OUT! and start over. Keep it in the refrigerator, covered until ready to bake.
4. When you use starter to bake, always replace with equal amounts of a flour and water mixture with a pinch of sugar. So, if you remove 1 cup starter, replace with 1 cup water and 1 cup flour. Mix well and leave out on the counter until bubbly again, then refrigerate. If a clear to light brown liquid has accumulated on top, don't worry, this is an alcohol base liquid that occurs with fermentation. Just stir this back into the starter, the alcohol bakes off and that wonderful sourdough flavor remains! Sourdough starters improve with age, they used to be passed down generation to generation!
5. Use this starter to make the Sourdough Chocolate Cranberry Cake, and the Sourdough Chocolate Cake.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Sourdough-Starter/Detail.aspx

but as you can see, they don't provide for feeding the starter so I stirred in 1T of flour and of water every day for 7 days. The starter, or Zool as I like to call him, has been doing something. No ugly smell or colors, just a nice alchohol smell and then on Saturday, the odor changed to sour. So I put Zool in the refrigerator, hoping to make something like BREAD today. :hi:

I mixed up a batch last night. Since it needs 18 hours to sit there, I have to plan the time. When I got up this AM, the gooey mess had not risen at all. Since I do not have the heat on, the kitchen was a little cool overnight. I just plugged in an electric radiator. put a wood trivet on top and the covered bowl on top of that. Maybe it was too cold. We'll see if something happens for the next 8 hours. This is only my 3rd time making this bread. The non-rise did not happen before.

wasn't really "on" yet. How's your gooey mess doing, Paper Roses? I've never tried the NYT's recipe.

In the mid 80s, I was living up in the Santa Cruz mountains and a few friends would get together every week for crafting. We did all kinds of things but the breadmaking is what I remember best. It worked out well because we all made different mistakes together!

:)

The 18 hours are up at about 2PM. I will then bake this little loaf. I think it is the easiest thing in the world to do. I'm sure it was too cold in the kitchen. The radiator thing really helped.

The dough did not rise as it should have and I thought it was my fault because of the cold room. It was time to proceed but the dough seemed soupy. I worked a little flour into the dough as I readied it for the pot. Anyway, I proceeded as usual. It is out of the oven. Flat, hard and horrible. Out it goes. Was it me or what?

lol

:hi:

or it could be that it was just so cold that it never really got started. You might want to be sure that the water you use when you mix your dough isn't too cold - it should be at least 60 - 70 degrees, up to about 100 degrees. How cool is your "cool rooom"?

What type of yeast are you using, and how old is it? Have you used it before?

Hope your next loaf turns out better!

the NYT bread. It has to be the cool room. I do not have the heat on right now. It was 61 degrees in the kitchen this AM. Maybe the water wasn't warm enough either. This recipe is so contrary to what I expect that I probably am doing it all wrong. I'm going to try another batch tomorrow PM to bake Thursday. Warmer room, warmer water.

Once that yeast hits all those carbos in the flour, it will grow.

It's just too easy to kill yeast when you proof it.

My kitchen is often in the mid 50s in winter and the stuff still rises just fine. It takes a little longer, though, than it does at 80.

So, I fed him again (1c warm water, flour) and will let him sit out of the 'frig for a few hours to make sure he digests. Will repeat that two more days and see what he's up for on Friday.

Thanks, housewolf!

One suggestion I would make is not just to add flour and water, but to pour out about half (or more, depending on how much you've accumulated so far) each time, then "double" the remainder by adding adding back an equivalent amount of a water/flour mix. There is no benefit in accumulating large quantities of starter because unless you "double" each time, the starter will acidify and weaken.

For instance, if you pour out all but 1 cup, then you'll want to add back a 1 cup mixture of water/flour. Leave the starter our and do that every 8 or 12 hours until the starter gets to the point where it will reliably double in volume at some point within the 8 hr period. That is the point at which the starter is "fully activated" and that, ideally, is when you'll want to use it for breadmaking. After that there is a period where it falls back down. Do this for a few days and keep an eye on it - you should find that it's activation time becomes fairly consistent and you'll learn how long it takes for it to fully activate. It's the flour that is the nutrition for the starter while the water creates a moist environment helpful for yeast & lactobacilli growth. I like to measure by weight - to me it's a simpler, easier, more flexible method, so I would keep a cup of starter then add back 4 oz of flour and 4 oz of water, creating somewhat of a thick mixture. If you measure by volume, the ratio is 3 parts flour to 2 parts water (you'll often see sourdough directions calling for 1 c water and 1 1/2 c flour). Each time I feed the starter I'd dump out all but 1 cup then add back 4 oz of flour and 4 oz of water. If I wanted a "thinner" starter, I'd still dummp out all but 1 cup and add back 3 oz of flour and 5 oz of water. Doing this over a period of time will create a mature, stable, consistent starter that you'll get to know, can depend on and know how to work with.

You might want to find a warm place for it to incubate inside the oven with the light on, for instance, or in a box with a light, or something. Most commercial bakeries incubate their starters at about 90 degrees - that seems to be optimum for yeast development. Once your starter matures you can transition it to room temp - depending on house temperature. The yeast in sourdough starters is not as temperature-tolerant as the yeast that we buy tends to like warmer temperatures. Once your starter is mature you can experiment with various temperatures and see how they affect the yeast, using the amount of time it takes for the starter to double in volume as a guide.

Hope this all helps - sourdough is a very fun journey and oh! so rewarding!

Zool is in the oven with the light on.

Reliably double in an 8 hour period? Hmmm. Okay, I'll try that. I have time to do it once before bedtime and again in the morning.

:hi:

since it's still a new starter, it may take it a little while until it matures and is stable and reliable.

Let me know!