Bread Yeast Question

[Addie]

I sometimes take my sourdough starter camping, even if I'm not going to use it, just so it can get fresh air.

Yes, I am a strange duck.

But it makes sense, exposes it to new yeast and bacteria strains.

TBS

Brilliant in my book! And new flavors.

 

[expatgirl]

I was thinking the same thing, Addie........though `i posted this earlier.......btw this mideast computer and my violating violinst that strums next door`i'm going mad.........`i don't know why the post didn't show up.......oh, well, no ef, you are not a wild duck........would love to taste some of your starter.......`i bet it's great........

 

[Cooking Goddess]

I sometimes take my sourdough starter camping, even if I'm not going to use it, just so it can get fresh air...

I'm sure Sean Charles McYeastington appreciates a nice camp-out in the woods as much as you and your Beloved Rachel do.

Finally dragged up a bag of bread and a 1# bag of Red Star yeast that I bought at the Amish general store this past summer. I think it's about time I thought of making homemade bread again. It has been years! My only fear is that we're gonna gain weight...

 

[Addie]

I was thinking the same thing, Addie........though `i posted this earlier.......btw this mideast computer and my violating violinst that strums next door`i'm going mad.........`i don't know why the post didn't show up.......oh, well, no ef, you are not a wild duck........would love to taste some of your starter.......`i bet it's great........

Unfortunately, I let my starter die. Time to start another one. I am going to buy some grapes this coming week and will use a couple of them for the starter. I just wish I could go camping and give it some fresh air like ef does every so often.

 

[erehweslefox]

Unfortunately, I let my starter die. Time to start another one. I am going to buy some grapes this coming week and will use a couple of them for the starter. I just wish I could go camping and give it some fresh air like ef does every so often.

I have to say, grape skins and, it is the time of year for it, apple skins, have some very friendly yeasties. I will occasionally goose Mr. McYeastington with some grape skins or apple peels when he gets peckish.

Currently as we just moved I am in the period where the starter is adjusting. While I am tempted to throw it some apple/grape skins to speed up the process, I think I will let it sit. Poor starter is traumatized from the move, I owe it to him to let him adjust on his own timetable, right?

So full non-sourdough bread for a while, lucky I have a container of good red star yeast. Those little bugs aren't upset by anything.

 

[erehweslefox]

I can recommend "English Bread and Yeast Cookery" by Elizabeth David. - all you could ever want to know about bread making past and present and lots of useful information about making it. Just be careful of her salt quantities as she uses the British equivalent of Kosher Salt which is a lot less salty than ordinary table salt.

Mad Cook, I just kind of ran into Elizabeth David, from another recommendation which yours came on top of. I've ordered her French Country Cooking book. I also think she is a very interesting individual and worthy of some of my reading attention. I adore and try to recreate historical recipes, so I very much appreciate her quite historical approach to cooking and baking. I really really love medieval recipes so that book is gold.

If I might, I'd, as I usually do, recommend to you Darina Allen's Forgotten Skills of Cooking. If you judge my cookooks by how stained they are, this is the best one, or the dirtiest? It certainly gets used quite a bit and it spends more time on the kitchen counter then on the bookshelf for sure.

TBS

 

[Mad Cook]

Excellent book tenspeed, I recommend it. I also would recommend for bread one of my go too books on ALL things cooking. Darina Allen's "Forgotton Skills of Cooking" to wit:

Forgotten Skills of Cooking: The Time-Honored Ways Are the Best--Over 700 Recipes Show You Why by Darina Allen, Hardcover | Barnes & Noble®

It has an excellent chapter on breads and baking, including the best description I have seen on making your own sourdough starter, and maintaining it.

The Allen book also has quite a few other things to its credit. The chapter on tripe alone is worth buying it, and makes my Beloved Wife EXTREMELY NERVOUS when I start to look at. Poor wife, she is more often the victim then the beneficiary of my culinary adventurism.

I'm still not allowed to go to Chinatown unsupervised after the Jellyfish incident of 2009. In my defense the Jellyfish were on sale, and I got an excellent price for them. I mean can I be faulted for not knowing how to prepare jellyfish? Do you know how to prepare them?

Of course my sourdough starter has a name. Sean Charles McYeastington. If he were a person he would be a staid solid Englishman, prone to wearing tweed blazers with worn elbows perhaps with a touch of chalkdust about him. Takes his tea at four pm precisely he does. One lump of sugar, which he feels rather guilty about and no cream.

But have you any idea how disgusting tea is with cream in it. Milk or lemon please (and for me - semi-skimmed!)

 

[erehweslefox]

But have you any idea how disgusting tea is with cream in it. Milk or lemon please (and for me - semi-skimmed!)

Oh with a nice assam I'll put clotted cream in it. Now a Darjeeling is always made unadulterated, or perhaps with a little bit of lemon.

TBS

 

[rodentraiser]

If you're using grape and apple skins, don't you have to make sure to use the organic grapes and apples? I'd hate to make sourdough from insecticide-laden fruits.

 

[Addie]

If you're using grape and apple skins, don't you have to make sure to use the organic grapes and apples? I'd hate to make sourdough from insecticide-laden fruits.

You can still give them a good washing. Then let the grapes and apples (or any fruit that has a smooth skin for that matter) sit out on the counter for a couple of days. They will still catch the wild yeast in the air. BTW, whatever fruit you choose to use, will affect the flavor of the food you use for the final dough product.

When I had the Girl Scouts, because we always had our first meetings at the very beginning of Sept., it was a perfect time for them to do this project. Each week they took their project home and had to feed it each day. Then come November. We met in a church with two large ovens. The troop monies provided the flour and each girl made a loaf of bread in time foor Thanksgiving dinner. Those kids were so proud of what they had made. Now that is definitely "cooking from scratch."

 

[GotGarlic]

If you're using grape and apple skins, don't you have to make sure to use the organic grapes and apples? I'd hate to make sourdough from insecticide-laden fruits.

It's a myth that organic farmers don't use pesticides, and the ones they use are often more harmful than those used by conventional farmers, which are not very harmful at all with recommended use. So, no worries

https://blogs.scientificamerican.co...101-organic-farming-conventional-agriculture/

https://www.geneticliteracyproject....demonization-organic-farmers-widely-use-them/

 

[Addie]

I make my produce organic myself with a good cleansing and scrubbing. For those veggie and fruits that can't stand up to this type of treatment, they get a good rubbing and water changing several times. Such as asparagus and peaches. Although I have been know for using a soft toothbrush on them when really in doubt. For foods that need to stay crispy such as lettuce, several cold water changes. More than normal. If I feel the produce can tolerate it, then it is several warm water and cold as the last.

 

[Cooking Goddess]

You can't make your produce "organic" by washing it, Addie. All you can do is make it clean. Some pesticides penetrate the tissues of a food. They don't get washed away with rinsing or soaking.

PRODUCE PURIFICATION 101: CAN WASHING FRUITS & VEGGIES REMOVE PESTICIDES?

From the article: "The short answer is no, not entirely. According to the National Pesticide Information Center, washing produce reduces pesticide levels but doesn’t completely remove them."

 

[Addie]

You can't make your produce "organic" by washing it, Addie. All you can do is make it clean. Some pesticides penetrate the tissues of a food. They don't get washed away with rinsing or soaking.

PRODUCE PURIFICATION 101: CAN WASHING FRUITS & VEGGIES REMOVE PESTICIDES?

From the article: "The short answer is no, not entirely. According to the National Pesticide Information Center, washing produce reduces pesticide levels but doesn’t completely remove them."

Thanks for the info. I am doing everything I can possibly do so I take in fewer chemical and fungi in order to try and keep myself healthy.

 

[Souschef]

Thanks for the info. I am doing everything I can possibly do so I take in fewer chemical and fungi in order to try and keep myself healthy.

Since you do not eat anything, that should be easy

 

[taxlady]

But have you any idea how disgusting tea is with cream in it. Milk or lemon please (and for me - semi-skimmed!)

Agreed. I'll put full fat milk in English Breakfast Tea or Irish Breakfast Tea if I don't have any 2%, but I really, really prefer 2% milk in my Earl Grey.

 

[Addie]

Since you do not eat anything, that should be easy

Sure is!

 

[erehweslefox]

I am rinsing out my apple skins from my stuffing this Thanksgiving, 20 minutes under clear water, and giving them to the starter. Mr. Seamus McYeastington has gone wierd, gotten very tart. I think there is a bacteria war going on. So I am going to add some apple peels for good soldiers.

 

[JustJoel]

Yeast brand differences

There is quite a bit of info in this yeasty thread, but I have a new question should I start a new thread?).

What are the differences in brands of yeast. Most bloggers and cookbook authors seem to have a preference, and it’s pretty much divided between Red Star and SAF (Red and Gold are whole nuther debate, it seems), but the most widely available brand here in Vegas is Fleischmann’s, which rarely receives a mention in the blogs or books.

What are the differences between brands? Taste? Rise efficiency? Shelf life? Or is it more a case of personal preference?

 

[dragnlaw]

Yeast Brands

I have never looked for others but I'm pretty sure that Fleischmann's is the only brand we even have around here.

Good question JustJoel!