The suggestion Balance made about the starter being too thin made sense. When I fed last night I cut the water a bit and made it a little thicker. Results were no froth on top and a few teeny bubbles throughout and no hooch. No rise to speak of but some progress it would seem.
Since I have 2 going right now I want to keep feeding one the same.although thicker in consistancy than before, and add rye flour to the other. Maybe I can get the desired results with one or the other. Maybe both.
I guess I should mention that they are both about 8 days old right now. I wonder how long I should go before I give up on these and start over again?
PS: The friends of Carl oregon trail starter has not come in yet. Should be here any day and I intend to make it my go to starter if I learn to do starters.
One tip I’d suggest is to keep adding to it (flour with a bit of water) without discarding any. It takes time to get enough of the right yeast. We’re all so used to commercial yeast that we think it should all happen faster.
Getting the starter going is a long and painful process, but once you have it you’re set for life.
It depends, but in my experience, 4-5 days should be enough to get a vigorous starter going, especially if you get it going with a mix of rye and wheat.
Friends of Carl is a great starter. I had one going in China for about 7 years before I moved back to the US. I have another one I need to start up. Also, I think that Friends of Carl is one of the coolest concepts around.
Once you have your sourdough started, I found you only need to feed it in the fridge every few weeks. I tried to do it weekly but it didn’t seem to suffer any ill effects by going for a few weeks.
The other big learning I had on sourdough is activating your starter for when you really want to bake. My rookie mistake was to just take some starter out the fridge, mix up my sourdough and it rose poorly with little sourdough tang. There are plenty of directions out there on getting your starter from the fridge to actually being ready to make bread with it. Long story short, use part of your starter to make a sponge. This means adding flour every 12 -24 hours, pouring off some of the mixture, adding more flour, repeat, until there is a nice foamy sponge. This is active “sour” yeast that you make the bread with.
My opinion; go for a consistency something like pancake batter, although a sponge starter can be neglected for longer. However, you have to learn how to handle it. Be aware that using chlorinated tap water can have an adverse affect on the yeast and bacteria you are trying to cultivate.