Juniper Berry Bread Starter

[gfron1]

Inspired by hummingbirdkiss' mention in the Starting a Sourdough topic, where she talked about the use of juniper berries, I decided since I live in the land of junipers, I would give it a go!

To start with I have made a sourdough starter once before. I used organic grapes from our local co-op. Everything went according to plan, but after about 6 months, I got tired of feeding it and looking at the grungy jar, so it was laid to rest. My spouse, however, has nagged me to make bread ever since, but my interests have leaned much more sweetly since that time. But with hummingbirdkiss' mention lingering in my mind I set off to collect the berries.

Now, if I'm going to do it, I'm going to give it my all. I decided to hike up our highest peak and gather the berries off of the top of the mountain, that way I could call it Bear Mountain Sourdough (nice ring, huh!). As many great tales begin...it was a dark and stormy day.

Not really a day recommended for climbing a mountain. But I did. My pups and I loaded up a small sack and decided to race the rain. Curiously, the weather wasn't too bad going up, but there was enough humdity in the air that I noticed the smells that are normally lost to our daily dryness. The smells (and this is no exaggeration) were of grocery store baking bread! A good omen I thought. I got 2/3 up the mountain making very good time, and the scent shifted just a bit. I've learned to pay attention to my nose up in the mountains because my dogs are surely smelling the same thing, and they love to chase animals. This scent was unmistakably - bear. Not good. I saw a bit of fresh scat, and some tree scratchings so we just started singing Valderi, Valdera loudly enough that it would scare off any animal. But the scent got stronger. I assumed we were following the bear (and he was probably wondering why we were chasing it singing a stupid song).

I hit the summit, logged in the summit journal, and pulled out my ziplock. I quickly filled it with a dozen juniper berries - the biggest, plumpest, whitest ones I could find.

I did my best to not knock off any of the natural yeast that coated the berries. I didn't even know this was yeast until hummingbirdkiss told me. Not even a minute after picking the berries, the thunder started roaring like a loud bear (the comparison to the forbidden fruit was not lost on me). My dogs are used to hiking with me, and we've been in some tight spots before so I'm sure they understood clearly when I said, "We need to get off this mountain right now."

And we did, we ran as fast as the trail allowed down the path. The thunder kept getting louder and the rain started to fall. All scent was gone now - no bear, no bread...had I destroyed the garden of knowledge?!

(This will seem anti-climatic) Then we got to the car and drove home incident free. I went to the kitchen and pulled out my materials.

I used hummingbirdkiss' formula of 1 C. flour, 1 C. water and 6-8 berries. I covered the jar with saran wrap with small holes cut in it and kept it in a warm place.

One week later I had this:

A good start (or starter in this case).

Two days after that I had this:

This was looking really good!

But then things fizzled as I tried to feed it. Now, nearly a month later I have this:

Don't be confused by the bubbles, they're from me pouring into a new jar moments before the picture. I have a good sour-smelling pancake batter.

So that is my story as of today. I'm looking forward to a resurrection of sorts with this starter. Any ideas?

[slkinsey]

Rob, what happened is that bacteria and yeast from the juniper berries and in the flour were able to survive for a certain period of time and eat the sugars in the flour (thus, causing the starter to appear "active"). Then, after a while and a bunch of generations of feedings, those microorganisms died out, resulting in the low-activity starter you have now. Juniper berry microorganisms are evolved to live on... well, juniper berries. Not in a continually refreshed sourdough starter. That is a completely different environment.

If you want a healthy starter, feed it twice a day with an extra-thick batter of flour and water (this approximates equal weights of flour and water), and before each feeding discard the entire contents of the starter jar except for a tiny bit clinging to the side of the jar. This creates the optimal growth conditions for sourdough microorganisms, and you should have a working starter after a while. It won't have any juniper berry mircoorganisms in it, though.

[CanadianBakin']

I'm not an expert by any means but I did just begin a starter about 2 months ago as part of a class with a world class pastry chef. I brought my starter to class one day because it was looking lifeless and he said my starter was too liquid. I stirred in a good scoop of bread flour and by half way through the class it looked great again. Now I just make sure to always have quite a thick batter. I don't know if this will help or not but it might be worth a try. I'd also be tempted to remove the berries as I don't think you need them anymore. If it still smells right I think you should be able to revive it.

[hummingbirdkiss]

I am not an expert as you can tell from that thread! but I agree with CanadianBakin just add more flour and see what happens ..I may be wrong but I think it is looking good just needs more flour!

btw your pictures make me long for New Mexico ..I usually spend at least the second half September there ...this year everyone is coming to me ...I am happy to have them all here ...but I am going to miss the chile harvest/roasting hiking on the mesa's .the smells and sights...

those berries look exactly like the ones I used to use...

I have also used them in sauces btw so next time you go gathering take some home and dry them ..they are awesome with poultry!

Edited August 6, 2007 by hummingbirdkiss (log)

[NickLam]

Hi,

Gfron, you might be having a case of Leuconostoc bacteria in your flour. What happens is this bacteria lives in many flours and as it grows in your not-yet acidified starter, it produces carbon dioxide. Therefore, you might think that you have good yeast activity when it is not the case.

I did a web search on Leuconostoc for some scientific background and found the next best thing, Peter Reinhart's blog! http://peterreinhart.typepad.com/peter_rei...ough_start.html

Just ignore the initial burst of activity as it will die down when your dough is more acidic. Thats when the real yeasts take over.

Hope this helps!

Cheers!

[CanadianBakin']

Rob, how's your starter doing? Has it revived?

[gfron1]

Is that like "How's your gout doing?"?

Its doing really well. I was going to give it another day before I showed the living dead to the group here. I've been feeding it (what a concept). The first day I fed only flour to get it to a consistency that is consistent with my memory of starter. Then I've been doing the flour water feedings since. The smell is out of this world - better than the smell from my previous grape starter. I know this is cheesy but I really want to shape my first loaf in a small round boule (if I'm using the correct word) and form it into the shape of a juniper berry.

[jackal10]

Try a starter without any berries, just flour and water.

Otherwise you have to wait for the junk you introduced to drop out.

Sa Sam noted above its the bugs that feed on flour you want, not those that feed on berries or sugar.

Temperature is important and selects the sort of bugs you get. Around 80F is ideal

[hummingbirdkiss]

I say take a scoop out try to make some bread or pancakes with it and see what happens

[gfron1]

I'm going to go for a loaf this weekend. I am tempted to do a traditional starter, but that's not really the point of what I'm trying to do - I want to play with hummingbirdkiss' juniper starter - so I'm ploughing ahead! I'm continuing the feedings, aeration and other suggestions from above. Thanks to all for the suggestions.

[CanadianBakin']

I'm going to go for a loaf this weekend.  I am tempted to do a traditional starter, but that's not really the point of what I'm trying to do - I want to play with hummingbirdkiss' juniper starter - so I'm ploughing ahead!  I'm continuing the feedings, aeration and other suggestions from above.  Thanks to all for the suggestions.

←

I could be totally wrong but I thought a starter needed to be a couple months old before it would be strong enough to make a loaf. Our chef said it needed time to develop properly. Maybe he was just referring to flavour rather than strength. I'll be interested to see how yours turns out. I've used my starter for bread that was assisted with a bit of regular yeast but now that it's couple months old I'm going to begin today to make a straight sourdough loaf with it. The recipe I'm going to use takes 3 days so I'll have to wait to see if it works.

[hummingbirdkiss]

I'm going to go for a loaf this weekend.  I am tempted to do a traditional starter, but that's not really the point of what I'm trying to do - I want to play with hummingbirdkiss' juniper starter - so I'm ploughing ahead!  I'm continuing the feedings, aeration and other suggestions from above.  Thanks to all for the suggestions.

←

I bet it works

with all that great New Mexican energy how can it fail????

Edited August 9, 2007 by hummingbirdkiss (log)

[gfron1]

The dough is rising right now. Here's the starter that went into it. I built it up and did the 2x daily feedings. Still a great smell.

[hummingbirdkiss]

did it work?

[gfron1]

Round #1 - Failed.

I went back to the Bread Bible and converted it from a liquid to stiff starter and I'm in the 2nd round right now. My cup of starter is in a 6 hour rising right now, so I'll know if a few hours if its working.

[gfron1]

Round #2 - Failed.

I already have low bread self-esteem, and this isn't helping. So my second mound of dough didn't do anything either. But, there is hope. Like I said, I converted to a stiff starter, and have been feeding it 2x day. Today at lunch I took this picture. It had a soft crust on the top, and was gooey and bubbly underneath. That sure seems like a good sign. So I'll start a new loaf tomorrow and see what happens. Thanks for the advice and encouragement.

[hummingbirdkiss]

maybe it was my poor advice this is the second idea I have posted that involved yeast that failed I am sorry

[gfron1]

Perk up little hummingbird its all about the journey for me. I'm gonna keep pluggin' away till I have a beautiful loaf.

[slkinsey]

Here is something I posted eons ago in the rec.food.sourdough newsgroup. I think it speaks fairly directly to what's happening here. The original topic had to do with the wisdom of using a alread-established starter culture versus starting one yourself. For some reason, people who are new to sourdough baking (I should hasten to add that I have no idea as to the level of sourdoush expertise among participants in this thread) often want to begin my making their own starter culture. This makes the task of sourdough baking, which is not without challenges in the best of circumstances, exponentially more difficult.

Well, it all depends on whether you are interested in sourdough baking because you want to make good bread or whether you are also interested in the challenge of creating your own sourdough starter. Even with a predictable starter culture, sourdough baking can be occasionally tricky. For someone who has never baked sourdough bread before and may be experiencing trouble, beginning with a predictable starter eliminates one possible source of trouble.

How do "established" starters get that way? They are propagated for years and years, generations and generations. Also, "established" starters are the end result of selective disposal. For every 100-year-old starter there were countless starters that thrown away because their properties were simply not special enough to merit saving. People did, in fact, give up on all those other starters. Further, it is a relatively well-accepted fact that certain special properties in sourdough cultures don't come into being until a certain amount of time has passed. For example, one can reasonably expect that the symbiotic relationship between microorganisms that have coexisted in a starter for several decades will be much stronger than what is found in a months-old starter culture. This is one reason why these old, established sourdough cultures are such consistent performers and are often quite resistant to change/invasion by other sourdough microorganisms.

So the question becomes whether you want to learn how to surf or whether you want to learn how to make your own surfboard. Most people would agree that it makes a lot more sense to learn how to surf first, rather than doing both at the same time.

[gfron1]

I hope no one thought slkinsey's essay disuaded me. I was just battling through this project. To respond to slkinsey first however. The essay was well timed and much appreciated. Based on my disasters and ugly messes, baking has always been about the journey for me and the outcome, when positive, is a joyous surprise. So learning to perfect a starter and bake a loaf at the same time is just a-o-kay with me

That said, I continued to feed and build up my starter since the last post. Feeding always twice a day, and maintaining it as a stiff starter. Since I didn't start off with an accurate recipe, everything since is just conjecture and using my limited experience. On Thursday I thought it was time to leap into a new loaf attempt. I used the recipe from the Bread Bible and then modified it to be the consistency that made sense to me (meaning it came out much more sticky than I think it should have so I thickened it).

Rise #1 went fine. Rise #2 went equally fine although it took twice as long. Rise #3 did not seem to be going well, but I figured at this point WTH! I placed it in my banneton (which has been collecting dust for about 5 years). I put it in the fridge because I ran out of time last night. This morning I put it on the counter to warm - of course on the coldest day we've had all summer (70 F). I went off to work and came home 5 hours later. Heated the oven as per instructions. Plopped her in on my stone, spritz and prayed to Nicholas of Myrac (Patron Saint of Bakers). About a half hour later I had this:

I could not be happier! The sourness was very intense, not unpleasant, but very rustic-ally biting. The crust was near as perfect as I like it - not too thick, but good and crunchy (I hate crusts that hurt my mouth). The inside was just a tad chewy in a good way, and light. I would like it lighter next time, but no one would spit this bread out.

So there you have it...Loaf #1 from the Bear Mountain Juniper Sourdough Starter. On behalf of the academy I would like to thank hummingbirdkiss and everyone else who gave advice in this thread! Cheers! ~Rob

[hummingbirdkiss]

that is absolutely beautiful!!! I am so happy for you!!!

[Abra]

I'm kind of surprised by Sam's suggestion that making one's own starter is really far out. I've made the Silverton grape starter twice over the years, and both times it worked wonderfully right from the start. Maybe because no one told me it's supposed to be hard to make your own starter?

Rob, your bread looks really nice. The chewiness you describe and the relatively fine grain of the bread suggest to me that your dough was lacking in oomph by the end. Did you slash the loaf, or are those cracks in the crust? Do you detect any juniper influence?

[gfron1]

I made 3 slashes. Its been a while but I remembered a recent post on another topic that said slash with confidence and don't look back. My first slash was whimpy, but the other two were good and you can see them in the pic. Even with that I had a crack.

As far as the juniper influence, its hard to tell. I did not taste "juniper" at all. But what impact it had on the starters taste and especially the sourness is unknown. This is the sourest bread I've ever made and the closest to San Fran sourdough, but I don't have enough comparison points to be able to make any other comparisons.

I'll be baking a few more loaves in the next week or so and we'll see if the sour remains. Then it will be time to start playing!

[gfron1]

A bit of an update. I let the starter go dormant since about the last post (6 months). I love the idea of making sourdough, but the feedings...sheesh! It reminds me of Feed Me Seymour! But I recently read Jackal's ECGI demo on sourdough and it was so easy and logical. So I pulled my starter out 10 days ago. It was pretty nasty looking - a bit of mold too. I stirred carefully and poured a cup into a new jar. I then followed jackal's recommended feeding. It became bubbly again on the third day, and by the fifth literally burst its seems. This jar was half full and it blew the top!

So last night I started the process of baking a loaf. And here it is:

Its about as good as I could want. I made a few mistakes but nothing that anyone will care about. Namely I turned on the top oven and threw the bread in the bottom one - oops! It gave an extra rise to things. I also would have liked to have baked it a few minutes longer, but this is a perfect texture. An astute observer will notice the bottom being slightly underbaked. That's because my hot stone was in the top oven.

Six months later I don't have that super strong sourness that this starter had before, which is unfortunate. My guess is I lost a lot of it in the jar that I dumped out of. So now we'll see if my motivation to keep her alive continues, and if it does I'll work on sourness.