Sourdough or Sour Dough?

Today is a little different, straying from the memories and probably invoking that special ADHD power we posses. After seeing online all these wonderful women making and baking sourdough and pizza crusts, brownies, and more- I decided that it was time to start one myself. Reading anything too long is not my super power. I tend to skim across things and pick out key words that I know I'm looking for and then read the sentences before and after that key word to confirm if that's what I need. It often leads to success in what I'm doing- but sometimes it fails.

Wondering if right now that's a failure. I started "Bertha" in a 1 gallon pickle jar that was saved and washed out. I didn't have a scale so I ordered one and it didn't arrive until yesterday or so. So I started her with 1 Cup of flour and 1 Cup of water. It was really thick- so I added more water thinking it needed to be thinner. Just winging it here. There wasn't much change over night, smelled like sweet bread. I often keep my house on the cooler side so I thought that it was not working correctly because she wasn't warm enough. So I moved her into the living room where our wood stove is.

After day 2 she started to show signs of life. A little bit of bubbling, and a little rising of the dough. Some of my apprehension started to go away as she got bubblier, and bubblier. Reduced her by half that evening and still didn't notice much change in her smell. Still kept that consistency of a pancake batter, maybe a little thinner. But over all it looked good. Or so I think. If I knew what it was supposed to look like...right? 😂😂

Wondering about reducing? You simply ladle out half your jar and throw it away. It's not safe to use at this point since it's full of bad bacteria. You're growing good bacteria and can't keep this in there. What I do is water it down to the point it's like water and just run it down the sink. It's great for your septic if you're on one. Just be careful and not have it too thick as it can turn to almost cement in your pipes if it's not watered down.

Day 3 she started to get a little more active. Moved her from the table back to the kitchen so I could watch her better under the light and do what I needed to do. Reduced by half, weighed out 300 grams of flour and 325 grams of water. For some reason using the All Purpose flour makes it a little thicker than I want so I add just a touch more water to keep it that nice consistency. By night she was bubbly and seemed to be happy.

Day 4 she ended back in the living room. And I plugged in an electric radiator heater on low below her so she could stay warm. Rinse and repeated the reduce by half and added 300:325 ratio and replaced her growth mark and put her back to bed. Err, by her heater. By evening she was rising almost 1.5 inches above her line and starting to smell like beer. Guess that means she's fermenting correctly!

Day 5 (today) she's a little listless. She fell to her original line again indicating she was hungry and she REALLY smelled like beer. Even had a hooch line of liquid that had to be poured off. Curious as all get go, I put my finger in it and tasted it and it tasted like a terrible beer. Go figure we're working with a yeasty subject and that's exactly what it tasted like. Not sure why I thought it was going to be any different. ADHD? 😂😂

Reduced her by half, added her first of 12 hr feedings at the same ratio. I need to feed her earlier because she got fed at noon so that means tonight she gets fed again when I would LOVE to be in bed snoozing instead of kindling this long term relationship I have with this jar of sourdough. So I will be adjusting that. Might just feed her when I get up to give Jason his morning meds and that way by a decent time frame she'll be fed again instead of waiting up all night long when I could have had some shut eye for a while.

Already starting to pin some amazing looking recipes to my search folders- maybe need to get my Pinterest in order and start putting them in there and sharing them with you. If you haven't thought about starting one of these starters I would take the gamble and try one yourself. It seems fairly easy and so far hasn't been rocket science. I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer and if I can figure it out- so can you!

-Bre