Solid Beer

[LLoyd]

Why not put a sourdough shaped PEG in a beer shaped HOLE?
Given that flour is chock full of complexe carbohydrates that break down fairly slowly, a ferment should sustain for some time.
So instead of constantly removing fermented material from the starter daily, we could add all the flour and maybe some "fermentables" and BREW it for a length of time. As we would bottle or keg our finished beer, we would bake our ferment in a loaf.


So here's my plan so far..

I've mixed
100g rye 50%
100g strong white flour 50%

40g white sugar 20%
1 tsp US-04 approx 0.5%

At 1.5 Hours







Tastes very similar to sweet liquer. Same level of sweetness, very grainy. Very active.


At 38 Hours.


Smells very alchoholic and sweet. Grain aroma is slightly stronger now aswell.
I reckon it's running out of bulk oxygen now, so i'll give it a day or so acidify a little, and then whack it in the fridge.
Two weeks from the start date I'm going to refresh it with fresh flour and water and bake it.

 

[LLoyd]

96 HOURS
Volume has dropped about 15%
Smells brilliant, not like alcoholic flour now. Getting some nice character.

 

[drsmurto]

Keep this thread going Lloydie. :super:

Am happy enough with the bread machine for making sandwich bread for day to day use but want to step up to making sourdough in the oven and croissants and the ultimate goal - pain au chocolate.

Am loving the bread porn! :lol:

Partners 30th in bit over 2 weeks so want to make a nice batch of sourdough loaves to go with the leg of lamb on the bbq.

Guess i need to start a few starters going this weekend?

 

[LLoyd]

Partners 30th in bit over 2 weeks so want to make a nice batch of sourdough loaves to go with the leg of lamb on the bbq.

Guess i need to start a few starters going this weekend?

Guess Mark's got a (fun) busy weekend!!

Sourdough makes THE best toast the next two days after baking! Katie reckons sourdough with peanut butter is the BOMB! I reckon a garlic bread made with rosemary instead (or aswell as) parsley would go with lamb...
I'll PM you a method for working out your ferment after bedtime story and dog/cat walkies..

Lloydie.

 

[LLoyd]

Guess i need to start a few starters going this weekend?

A few? You're keen..

 

[drsmurto]

I was planning on making 3-4 loaves so i figured i would need a decent sized starter of just a few smaller ones?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[LLoyd]

UPDATE 141 HOURS
She's dropped about thirty percent. Smells like a glass of spirits!! In the fridge this morning. The following week will bake something with it..

 

[drsmurto]

Lloydie - re-reading your OP.... what volume of liquid did you add to the starter and what was said liquid?

 

[LLoyd]

SOLID BEER ONE 7.5 days
Safely in the fridge and almost back to it's original volume.

Alcohol, lactic acid and acetic acid have a preserving effect. With SOLIDBEER1 smelling like spirits and having been inoculated 'naturally' I reckon he's pretty safe in the fridge til next weekend (14days total). My only real concern is that the acidity will damage the gluten. I think I've had it happen before with a red wine starter. My guess in the end was that it's super high acidity destroyed the gluten. However with the starter being only 33% of the total flour and half of that being rye, I'm not too fussed about it. I'll use a good strong flour for the final dough.

Rather than wait until next week to see the results of SOLIDBEER1, for the minimal risk/wastage I'm going to get another one going this weekend.For SOLIDBEER 2 my stab in the dark hypothesis is that "Yeast and Lactic acid producing bacterias will each have an individual effect on the fermentation of a common media"


My methods for managing the constants will involve sanitising all equipment until just prior to using with a food servise no-rinse sanitiser, and sanitising the medium using heat (microwave)
I will inocculate two equal portions of sanitised "solid wort" with different organisms. One being US-04 english ale yeast and the other being Browns SourCream.

For each group I will

1 Measure 100g boiling water 20gwhite sugar to a plastic container and micro wave on medium for three minutes.


2 Measure 50g White Rye and 50g Strong White flour into plastic container and microwave on medium for three minutes.

3 Measure 30g cream into plastic container and boil briefly.

4 Quickly mix flour water a with US-04 and cream.
mix flour water b with sour cream.

After one hour;

 

[drsmurto]

24 hours after making the starter as per the OP it looks the same as the pics. Smells like a ferment.

Looking forward to turning this into a few loaves next weekend.

I assume i can save a small portion like i do with beer yeast starters and re-start the process?

Hmmm, i need to find a name. Something french as i am a francophile.

Severine the starter?

Can i use this starter for making a whole range of breads? Baguettes, ciabatta etc

 

[Tony M]

LloydieP, What's going on with your solid beer. Even if it was a failure, we all want to know about it.

 

[Bongchitis]

Same here. Just starting to get interested in making my own sourdough and was following this with interest.

Nice work!

 

[drsmurto]

I turned my starter into 2 loaves on Friday night.

Left them in the oven a tad too long but the flavour and texture were impressive.

So much so i have another starter on the go for a loaf this weekend!

 

[Katherine]

Keep tune... he will be back!

Mark get a timer.... baker can't go with out it!

 

[chappo1970]

Awwwgh! What's happened to solidbeer1 Llyodie? I'm loving this thread it's getting me all enthused to start making bread again.

 

[chappo1970]

Update please LlyodieP or Katie?

 

[LLoyd]

Two weeks on SOLIDBEER1 became a loaf of white rye.. I don't like rye bread. RYE I like.. Needs more gluten I reckon so I'll address that when I bake SOLIDBEER2. Anyway #1 was a good starter, very active, no problems. We have a photo around somewhere, but it's not all that flash. I really need to try again without the rye to test it PHYSICALLY, cos the rye gluten just isn't strong enough.

SOLIDBEER2 has me really interested. The LACTO ONLY one smells like super earthy flour, without even a hint of alcohol. The US-04 smells like a sourdough, it almost stings my nose. Been pretty slack, I'm baking that one a week late (three weeks). I can't wait to see how they taste different, and how the LACTOs go leavening the bread. About to start that now.

Hey Mark, Richard Bertinet writes a great book on bread. In his main picture for his TOOLS he forgot to place his timer. It was on the next page with a cup of coffee and a reminder that
"..and yes, I forgot put a timer in the main picture, which just goes to prove my point that even when you've been baking all your life you can forget to time your bread"

I'll update SB2 in 24 hours or so..

 

[RobB]

This thread has inspired me to have a go.

A had a yeast cake of Wy1028 which had only been used for a half batch of brown porter and I didn't have any wort to tip on it. It seemed such a waste to use a smack pack for only half a batch so I scooped out half a cup of slurry and tipped it into a rye starter.

Normally our starters rise fairly sedately like dough, but this one was breathing and heaving like a volcanic swamp. The aroma was really fruity, too.

I'm feeding it up and I'll probably bake with it over the weekend.

 

[KHB]

I turned my starter into 2 loaves on Friday night.

Left them in the oven a tad too long but the flavour and texture were impressive.

So much so i have another starter on the go for a loaf this weekend!

Man wish i had time to make sourdough at home. You do know now i know you can make it i expect to see a few loaves at the amb swap

 

[drsmurto]

Man wish i had time to make sourdough at home. You do know now i know you can make it i expect to see a few loaves at the amb swap

Indubitably!