Hi Kenneth,


Kenneth wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:59:35 -0600, Sam
> > wrote:
>
>
>> All those situations I am avoiding now by using up all the starter right
>> away, keeping little containers with 35 g in the fridge for 6 month to
>> have some kind of backup.
>>
>>
>
> Hi Sam,
>
> In what form can you get a safe 6 months out of your backup?
>
> That is, what's in those containers?
>
A - 1/2 cup 118 mg 4 oz zip loc containers - 6 per starter
B - 35 g of Vollsauer (3rd stage of 3-Stage Detmold procedure) in a
container

Containers are in series - last one goes away, a new one goes on top.

Whenever I bake - usually once a month, I use the youngest container
content, take the few grams (10 or so) and grow a new starter from it.
Remainder goes back into the fridge.

When it's ready, I.discard the content of the last (oldest) storage
container and put 35 g into a new (sterilized) container in the fridge.

I maintain two starters in that manner in two different fridges.

With one container - as example 30 g used, I could get up to 6500 g of
starter which would give me over 17 kg of 60 % rye bread dough. With a
20 % rye bread dough, I would get over 52 kg. That's all way beyond
what I am and can be doing right now.

How far did I ever have to go back? I think it was 4 months at one point
when I was traveling.
I did two runs of starter growing in shorter sequence one only a week
after the first run.

From what I see how this went up to now I'd say that going back 6 month
would work with some extra effort - doing maybe 3 runs in shorter
sequence and maybe a bit longer rising times with the bread dough in the
first run.

More correct would be that starters of 6 generations of baking events
are kept back. But since I am baking about once a month, it just works
out that way most of the time.

Sam