Helllooooooo you all.....
The past few years have been hectic - with kids, their schools, moving houses, dad passing away, shifting into mom's house along with kids, new school for kids and now finally I'm up for kids homeschooling.
In the midst of all this chaos, I had not found time or rather completely forgotten about my blogs. They felt abandoned. They were begging me to come back. Meanwhile I had been toying with the idea of starting a cafe business. I have been thinking long and hard about it. What kind of food I would offer, what would be on the menu, what I would name it, where would I start it, how big would be the place, the interiors, the aesthetics, the prices etc., etc., you know - all that goes into a cafe business...
During this contemplation, I came across sourdough bread, how its made, its benefits etc., and vowed to put that on my menu. Sourdough bread is extremely healthy bread, since we use wild yeast from nature to make this bread. It has a slightly sour taste but tastes heavenly. Wild yeast is everywhere in nature and we are just feeding it some food and helping it grow in our jar.
Again, all the chaos and I wasn't even able to start the sourdough starter. Apparently very simple to do and I couldn't even do that. Anyways, a couple days ago, I ordered myself these cute little glass jars and promised myself that once those jars come, the first thing I would do is start one of those sourdough starters.
So truly enough, when the jars arrived, I promptly washed and cleaned one of them and set it aside. The next day I started my sourdough starter. And then, something amazing happened.... My blogs called out to me once again, begging me to come back to them. I promptly listened. So, now I am back in the blogging business.
Anyways, lets get to the recipe for the sourdough starter, if you can even call it a recipe. Its as simple as it gets, just 2 ingredients - flour and water. Its that simple. I cant believe, I put it away for so long.
Lets get down to business.... Here's how to...
START SMALL. So that wastage is also small....
Day 1:
Note down the time you start. Add equal measures of flour and water into the glass jar (I started with 10g flour + 10 g water). Mix well into a pasty dough. Cover the jar lid and set it aside. You can even keep it in the oven with the light on for a few hours (not overnight). You can leave it next to the stove while you do your cooking. Bottomline is that, keep it in a warm place for a few hours.
Day 2:
Do nothing... YES, you got that right. Do nothing the second day. Allow the starter to work its magic. Allow the wild natural yeast to grow. You can open the lid and check on the starter if you want. Do it at your own discretion (stinky smells are forming). You know what, get used to it. Because its gonna get a lot worse. Believe me !!
Day 3:
At approximately the same time as when you started your starter on Day 1, its time to feed your starter. Basically, what you are doing is - feeding the yeast that is in the jar and keeping it active and growing.
You can see that the dough has slightly risen. Or maybe not. Mine didn't, but I didn't give up.
Whether the dough has risen or not, here's what you do nevertheless. Discard half of what's in the jar. Again take the same amount of flour and water as the first day. Add them to the jar. Mix well with a spoon and make a dough. Cover and keep aside.
Day 4:
At around the same time on day 4, check on your starter. You can see tiny bubbles on the surface. If not, don't be disappointed. Every starter is unique. Some are slow rising, some are fast. Just keep feeding it.
Do the same what you did on day 3. Discard half. Feed equal amounts of flour and water. Mix well, keep aside.
However by day 4, I think you would need to put on some nose plugs. My starter was so stinky. Yuck !! If I didn't know better, I would throw away all of it and start fresh. It smells so bad that I gagged on it. Try it at your own discretion !! I would recommend not to.
Day 5 - Day 10:
Do the same thing as day 4, keep discarding half of what's in the jar. Then add equal amounts of flour and water (use the same measurements as you did on day 1 and every day after that). Every day, you will see some progress to the starter. By day 10, your starter must be quite bubbly and will have doubled in size the previous day. That's when you know your starter is ready to use.
If its not doubled in size, don't worry, give it a few more days... Keep feeding daily. Some starters take up to 15 days. Some get done in 7. So no worries. Both are good and completely normal. By now, the starter has gone from a stinky ugly smelling dish to a sweet smelling dough with lots of bubbles.
For now, I don't have my phone which has the photos in it. Once I get it from my kids , I will add the photos in here.
YAY !!! I finally made Cheesecake yum yum 🤤
