It's more an annoyance than anything else, or so I've read. It makes people
think they've got something going, and then all of a sudden, it seems to
die.
I've started up two starters and have had no problems, but from what I've
read, it seems fairly common.
Here's what Peter says:
"This bacteria masquerades as yeast in the early stage of a seed culture
starter, in that it generates a lot of carbon dioxide making it appear that
the wid yeast cells are growing rapidly. However, the wild yeast really
needs a more acidic environment than exists during the first few days of the
starter's existence and, unfortunately, the leuconostoc interferes with
yeast growth during this grand masquerade. At a certain point, as the
bacteria causes the dough to become more acidic, the acid actually
de-activates the leuconostoc (it actually contributes to its own demise),
but the wild yeast have not had a chance to propogate and grow in numbers,
so there is a domancy period in which nothing seems to be happening. Many
folks have assumed they killed their starter when it did not seem to respond
to a Day 3 or Day 4 feeding, and threw it out. Others waited and saw mold
form on the top of the starter and, of course, they too threw it out."
He's got two solutions:
1) Use pineapple juice the first two days. The acidity of the pineapple
juice kills the leuconostoc bacteria and gives the yeast an environment it
likes.
2) Stir the starter for the first few days a couple of times a day to aerate
it. Yeast do fine without oxygen, but they multiply more rapidly when oxygen
is present. So stirring helps get that O2 to the yeast.
--
Jeff Miller
Davies Murphy Group
781-418-2429 (w)
617-767-7537 (c)
200 Wheeler Road
Burlington, MA 01803
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
> ] On
> Behalf Of Ray
> Sent: Thursday, November 09, 2006 10:16 AM
> To:
> Subject: Starting new culture? ? ?
>
> Thanks Jeff --
>
> I'm not clear what you mean. Is "leuconostoc bacteria" usable
> for baking?
>
> It certainly puffed up like yeast.
>
> "Jeff Miller" > wrote in message
> news:mailman.17.1163082711.2884.rec.food.sourdough @mail.otherw
> hen.com...
> >
> > It could be that you're just lucky, but I thin it's more
> likely that
> > you've got leuconostoc bacteria taking off and not yeast.
> >
> > Here's a post from Peter Reinhart about it:
> > http://tinyurl.com/p7ayz
> >
> > Full address:
> >
> http://peterreinhart.typepad.com/pet...sourdough_star
> > t.html
> > --
> > Jeff Miller
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From:
> >> ] On
> Behalf Of
> >> Ray
> >> Sent: Thursday, November 09, 2006 9:17 AM
> >> To:
> >> Subject: Starting new culture? ? ?
> >>
> >> Recently I started a new sourdough culture in the usual way:
> >> I mixed flour and water into a paste, set it aside, and waited.
> >>
> >> Ordinarily it takes several days to "catch" a new wild yeast, but
> >> this time the culture puffed up within 24 hours.
> >>
> >> At the same time I was making this new culture, I as making some
> >> bread with an long-established culture. The two were never closer
> >> than five or six feet.
> >>
> >> My question is, did the new one simply catch the old one,
> or did it
> >> catch a new one?
> >>
> >> I might add, the new one has a slightly different
> fragrance than the
> >> old one. The new one has a distinctly cheesy fragrance.
> >>
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> rec.food.sourdough mailing list
> >>
> >> http://www.otherwhen.com/mailman/lis...food.sourdough
> >>
> >> To unsubscribe send a mail to
> >> and then reply to the
> >> confirmation request.
> >>
> >
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> rec.food.sourdough mailing list
>
> http://www.otherwhen.com/mailman/lis...food.sourdough
>
> To unsubscribe send a mail to
> and then reply to
> the confirmation request.
>