# Harvesting Barm For Soughdough Bread?



## Malted Mick (27/1/21)

Going to have a go at making sourdough bread. This may be a source of a great lactic/sour starter?
Wiki Info quoted below.
*Barm* is the foam or scum formed on the top of a fermenting liquid, such as beer, wine,[1] or feedstock for spirits or industrial ethanol distillation. It is used to leaven bread, or set up fermentation in a new batch of liquor. Barm, as a leaven, has also been made from ground millet combined with must out of wine-tubs[2] and is sometimes used in English baking as a synonym for a natural leaven.[3] Various cultures derived from barm, usually _Saccharomyces cerevisiae_, became ancestral to most forms of brewer's yeast and baker's yeast currently on the market. l


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## Grmblz (27/1/21)

Don't think so Mick, I'm no baker but I'm pretty sure you need bacteria for sour dough, barm will be too clean initially, traditional sour dough bakers keep a "mother" not dissimilar to kombucha/apple cider vinegar makers.
My next door neighbour makes sour dough in a wood fired pizza oven (I dislike commercial sour dough but hers is absolutely to die for) when she bakes I swap beer (her hubby is German and loves home brew) for loaves.
According to my neighbour, no two bakers produce the same bread, it's called the bakers "fingerprint" because over time the mother picks up the individual bacteria from the bakers hands, could be a load of old codswallop but it makes a good story, and just might have a grain of truth to it.
Either way good luck with it.


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## Malted Mick (27/1/21)

Yes Grmblz, that is correct about sourdough starters.You can make your own from bakers flour and water. The wheat flour contains bacteria which kicks of the lactobacillicus strain. I have been offered a proven sourdough starter so will do my first bake using it. Doing my usual research via goggle I came across the reference to barm and found it interesting, hence the post. I have also discovered that diastatic barley malt is referenced as the bakers secret ingredient, feeds the starter, adds flavoure and browns the crust!


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## Grmblz (27/1/21)

Ahhh! the diastatic sounds interesting, I wonder if my neighbour uses it, she's a bit secretive about the whole process, possibly worried I'll make my own, although Pete (her hubby) is a good bloke and would still get his rations, he pops round occasionally when she's gone to town and we have a couple of sneakies.
I've made the "no knead" rustic loaf and it comes out just as I like my bread, with a thick crust. Might have to give sour dough a go, how much malt is used? and what's the process? Would love to surprise my neighbour with something approaching her masterpieces. Don't have a wood fired pizza oven but thinking a bit of smoke in a covered BBQ might come close.


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## Malted Mick (27/1/21)

Ordered some today from Basic Ingredients here in Brisbane. Picking up the starter on Friday. Will bake early next week. From the BI website:

Diastatic Malt is used to help convert the starch found in flour to sugars that are useable by the yeast over an extended ferment. It is used by many Artisan Bakers in Europe, US, and Australia on a regular basis. Diastatic malt powder contains sugar breaking active enzymes (mainly amylase) whereas non-diastatic malt powder has no enzymes.

American Flours are routinely blended at the Mill with Diastatic Malt. This is not the case in Australia. Hence US sourced sourdough recipes//formulas may not work quite as good with Australian Flours. Adding Diastatic Malt can fix some of these problems.

Diastatic Malt is a completely natural product made from sprouted Barley or Wheat, dried and grinded. Normally Diastatic Malt is applied at 0.1% of flour weight. That is 1 gram/1kg flour!

A little tricky to use for the average Home Baker to apply. We therefor have a Malt Blend available called Diastatic Malt 10, which is 1 part Diastatic Malt and 9 parts Bread Flour. It is applied at 10g/1kg flour (approx 3 tsp; over-use it at your own peril, it's powerful stuff!)

Adding Diastatic Malt to your final dough can improve volume, flavour, colour, and texture. Until we find a Miller that is willing (and capable) of producing white flour, ideally suitable for Sourdough Baking, we recommend you use Diastatic Malt 10 as one of the ingredients in your white sourdoughs.

You do not need Diastatic Malt when predominantely using Wholemeal or Rye Flours.




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## Grmblz (27/1/21)

Excellent, thanks for that, I can feel a baking session coming on, will let you know how it goes.


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