This morning I read in The Guardian that “Celebrities and politicians with large social media followings are proving to be key distributors of disinformation relating to coronavirus”. That well-known epidemiologist Woody Harrelson is among those blaming 5G network masts for coronavirus.
Research by Oxford’s Reuters Institute for the study of journalism found that while politicians, celebrities and other prominent public figures were responsible for producing or spreading 20% of false claims about coronavirus, their posts accounted for 69% of total social media engagement.
And yet, right there is the self same Guardian, is coronavirus-adjacent misinformation from Guardian columnist Adrian Chiles: I have finally mastered the dark art of sourdough baking. Here's how to do it. OK, I can cut Mr Chiles some slack for his fast-and-loose history; a hack has to meet their word count. But I must correct three bits of egregious misinformation.
Keeping a sourdough going does not involve “discarding most of it every few days”. It can, if you’re a wasteful, privileged ninny, but it doesn’t have to. As a few of us have been telling the no-yeast noobs, you can keep less than 20 grams very handily in the fridge and just bring it out and feed it the day before you are due to bake. I doubt that I have discarded more than about 50 g of starter over the past 12 months.
Another benefit of keeping a small amount of starter is that you can then safely ignore another of Mr Chiles’ “key principles”. If you bring the starter out of the fridge to build your leaven, you will be assured that it is good and lively and ready to work.
Finally, while you certainly can “do the baking in a lidded pot, just big enough to accommodate the loaf” you do not have to. A nice heavy casserole or Dutch oven may improve your bread, and I often use one, but it is by no means essential. You can bake excellent bread without one. You can also bake excellent bread in a tin, if you prefer.
So much for real misinformation. I also take issue with the statement that “the making of the starter, over five days, is simple enough”. That is pretty misleading. It usually takes more than five days to get a decent starter going, and impatience is the downfall of many a beginner. I reckon it takes about 10 days to get a really good starter from scratch. And rather than discard any excess starter as you wait (or, indeed, at any point in the future) just mix it up with a bit of oil and a pinch of salt and fix yourself a sourdough pancake.
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Webmentions
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@cn I've added that to the CSS and had a look on Firefox - looks like thats sorted now. Thanks @jeremycherfas for flagging it up and thanks again @cn for the code. 🙏
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@strandlines you might be able get them to show in Safari too…
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@cn thanks for the code snippet. I will have a fiddle around and see if I can fix it.
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@jeremycherfas yes, thanks for posting this. @cn
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@cn I'm sure that's right.
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@strandlines it looks like the inline SVG nested in the
<span>with inline styles also need styling for Firefox e.g.:#kind-menu .svg-icon svg { max-width: 1rem } -
@strandlines Can you see this www.dropbox.com/s/fcpbh7s...
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@jeremycherfas ooh - that’s strange. I don’t see them. Other than a mb icon, I don’t have any others. At least, from my end that’s the case.
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@strandlines I meant the giant icons at the bottom right of the footer.
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@jeremycherfas thank you! I shall probably make some more this weekend. I had to look up fatwigoos - I assume you mean where I have the webring links. I copied the code from somewhere and haven’t tidied it up yet.
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@strandlines Looks good; well done. Are those fatwigoos on your site, bottom right? Not sure where the sizing should go, but it looks off to me.
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@jeremycherfas I’ll post a picture as a separate post as I can’t include one in a reply.
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@seishonagon Excellent news. More or less. If it doubles in volume within 12 hours, and doesn't smell funky, give it a whirl.
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@strandlines Pictures or it didn't happen.
I am so happy for you. Could be over or underproofed, but that barely matters. You're on the path now.
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@jeremycherfas all right I think I’m back on track! Once I’m at 1:2:2 I can start using it to bake?
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@jeremycherfas one loaf made yesterday. A little bit dense (I think I over-proved it) but an even texture and tasted like the real thing! My family enjoyed it so I take that as an endorsement. Thanks for your guidance.
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@strandlines Very good sign!
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@seishonagon And the temp? The thing is, you do better at not overfeeding by feeding a little, more often. That way, you maintain the acidity and the activity of the good bugs. So 4:1:1 starter:flour:water is fine at the outset, waiting for it to rise before the next feed. Then 3:1:1 to 1:1:1 and once it is reliably doubling within 8-12 hours at 1:1:1 yuou're good to go and to move feeding out to 1:2:2 and beyond.
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@jeremycherfas I was rather hoping to make some at the weekend so thanks for the advice! It is really quite chatty this morning, making ‘glop’ noises.
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@jeremycherfas i was trying not to over feed so I was looking at every two days.
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@seishonagon oh dear. You could try resurrecting. But it doesn’t sound good. How often were you feeding before? At what temperature?
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@strandlines sounds good to me. I reckon you could go for a trial bake on Sunday or Monday, with the possibility that it won’t be quite ready yet.
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@jeremycherfas dead in the water... i woke up yesterday to a flat, lifeless badly smelling glob. I’m going to have to start again!
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@jeremycherfas mine is nearly doubling in size in a 12hr period. Am feeding twice a day and have got it in the airing cupboard.
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@seishonagon@strandlines So, where are you all now?
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@seishonagon@strandlines OK, that's excellent news. But it is easy to become overconfident at this stage. You still need to build up acidity. That means not overfeeding. So, stir up what you've got, remove about 10 g to a clean container, and feed the same weight each of flour and water.
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@jeremycherfas oh bubbles galore!
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@jeremycherfas 48hrs in and I have bubbles.
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@seishonagon How is it doing now? Should be definite signs of activity.
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@jeremycherfas got it!
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@seishonagon Yes. Give it 48 hours. The goal it to build up acidity. So next time, feed 20 and 20. You don’t want to dilute too much at this stage.
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@jeremycherfas yeah I have 40g. Let's say there were a couple bubbles :-D I'll go slower now. So ... just watch and wait?
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@seishonagon When you say fed, you mean you gave the one you began yesterday more flour and more water? So you now have 40g. Or you only just began? Because I would advise waiting until you see bubbles before you next feed. Slowly does it at the start.
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@jeremycherfas so I went ahead and fed the starter 10g each of water and flour. No luck on the whole meal for now but still looking.
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@strandlines it is definitely worth a try, although one you receive as a gift will be truly yours soon enough.
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@jeremycherfas hmm, I have saved your post as I have got it into my head to make a starter. 🍞
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@seishonagon :thumbsup:
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@jeremycherfas ok. Quarantine may make it hard to get the high protein flour but I’ll try. For now. 10g and 10g ... I’ll let you now!
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@seishonagon Mix 10 g of your flour with 10g of water, cover loosely and leave in a warmish place for 24 hours. In the meantime, try to find some rye flour or some wholemeal. And in 10 days, you will need wholemeal and strong (i.e. High-protein >13%) white flour. Let's check in again in 24 hours. This could be fun.
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@jeremycherfas I have white “000” flour and a scale that works to the gram - although I’ve been looking for an excuse to buy a newer one.
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@seishonagon What flours do you have to hand? Do you have a good digital scale? That's important to know before we go further.
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@jeremycherfas ok I’ll bite: what’s the best, no-pundit-BS, method to get a starter going? I‘m pretty sure I have 10 days in front of me ....
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