I was reading some of the posts here, and thought I will say hi.

I live in the SF bay area, and I bake bread for the past 30 years (with
yeast)... I never took a course, never read a book about bread baking,
I just learned as I go..

Many of the things I learned over the years are posted here, and I find
it funny when I read that there are proper terms for things I do when I
bake bread, which I thought are "my secretes" (like Autolyse for ex.)

In the past few months I decided to learn more about sourdough and did
some research on the web, and founded this list..


I have created my own starter and baked with it. I like the crumb and
the speed, but the flavor was kinda plain.. With commercial yeast you
get some flavor, although common, but it has some flavor.
I have received some Carl's starter a week or so ago and I have baked a
few times with it.. Again, it works well, but the breads come out
missing something...

There is lots of info here, and the FAQ is good too, so I intend to do
some more experiments and see how to improve on what I am doing.

I have a couple of questions:
- Does anyone use "Patent flour"?
- Do commercial bakeries add some kind of acid to their "Sourdough"
bread to get this elusive tang?

Thanks,

Arie