Tag Archives: Sweet starter

March 28th, 2014

Dampfnudeln (oven baked)

Since weeks I was dreaming of oven baked Dampfnudeln. When I was a kid my mum would bake them for lunch regularly. But my love don’t like sweet stuff as main dish and so I make them seldom nowadays. But I love them still so much, especially the slightly sticky, sweet bottom which the dampfnudel gets because they are baked in a milk-butter-sugar mixture.

And so I decided to bake them only for me!

This time I made them with sweet starter and some yeast and they turned out great. Soft and light as air they rose really high. Served with some plum butter or vanilla custard this is a great lunch for people with a sweet tooth.

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March 23rd, 2014

Custard Streusel Cake

Category Cake & Pastry Tags: only with yeast, Pâte fermentée, Pudding, Streusel, Sweet starter, Vanilla 41 Responses

I posted already about my favourite Streusel cake recipe. Could a better recipe exist?

Yes.

It exists!

Add a layer of creamy vanilla custard between dough and streusel and you will get the best streusel cake ever!

I found the inspiration for this on Juttas Blog, who discovered the pudding streusel cake at Dampfi kocht und backt. I used my streusel cake recipe (which works greatly with sweet starter instead of pâte fermentée, too) but added a layer of homemade custard. And this mixture of soft custard and crisp streusel is just divine!

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March 22nd, 2014

How to dry and reactivate your sweet starter

Category Bread baking theory, Starter and Preferments Tags: How to do, Sourdough, Sweet starter 10 Responses

Having a active sourdough like the sweet starter is a good thing. But there is always the risk of loosing. It could starve while you are on a longer vacation or because you have no time for bread baking. Or (worst case scenario) some mould could start to grow on your precious sourdough. And that’s when a backup can be handy.

When I grow my sweet starter in December, I decided to test two different methods for storing sourdough: Freezing and drying. And after three months I tested which method provides a faster success when I reactivating. I mixed both the frozen and the dried starter with fresh flour and water and left them on the counter. After 20 hours the dried starter was clearly back to life as I could judge from the increase of volume. A feeding with flour and water showed that it could already triple its volume after 4 hours on 30°C, like it would before freezing.

The frozen starter was barely alive after the same time, only some tiny bubbles suggest that it was not completely dead. But that does not surprise me so much, because during the freezing process the water in the cells of the microorganisms starts to form crystals, which damage the cells. During drying on the other hand the cells form spores to survive the unpleasant situation and spring back to life as soon as it comes in contact with water and flour.

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March 20th, 2014

Baguette rolls with sweet starter

Category Bread Baking Day, Rolls Tags: Hand kneaded, Sweet starter, Über-Nacht 27 Responses

A short glance in our pantry told me last Friday that it was really time for restocking flour. And so the rolls I was planning to bake the next morning was dictated by the flour I had still in stock. And the rolls turned out great! Great oven spring, open crumb, crisp crust and a great flavour, too. And so I decided to post the recipe despite the fact that there is already a bunch of baguette recipe here on the blog.

And I will send them to Zorras Bread Baking Day as well. This month it is hosted by Food for Angels and Devils and is dedicated to the ultimate Baguette recipe.

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February 28th, 2014

Sandwich Bread with Sourdough and Sweet Starter

Category Bread Tags: Poppy seeds, Sourdough, Sweet starter, Toast 13 Responses

Sometimes I love a good sandwich bread. And then there are long phases it does not appeal me at all. But when I feel a hunger for sandwich bread I tend to bake it as soon as possible. That what happend last weekend.

And so when I saw the beautiful braided sandwhich bread with poppy seeds at Sara bakar I knew how the bread should look like. But I decided to use my own recipe with a combination of sourdough and sweet starter. This combination sounds strange in the beginning, but this combination results in a very mild bread with a slight yoghurt flavour. The sweet starter helps to let the bread rise in a relative short time as well!

The bread has a beautiful soft crumb and a nutty poppy seed crust and tasted so good that it vanished very fast!

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February 16th, 2014

Weekend Rolls

Category hand kneaded, Overnight, Rolls Tags: Hand kneaded, Spelt, Sweet starter, Über-Nacht, Wheat 22 Responses

After all the sweet posts something hearty is needed here on the Blog!

At the moment I bake a lot of bread using my sweet starter because I’m still in love with my not sour sourdough. I hope it is not getting boring for you. But the sweet starter allows me even to make dough which can rise in the fridge for 24 hours or longer without degrading the gluten or getting to sour. I used a cold fermented dough already for this baguettes. My weekend rolls work the same way, the dough rise in the cold for 12 to 36 hours and whenever I need rolls on the weekend I take some dough out and bake them freshly. The recipe will yield 10 Rolls, but the recipe can easily be doubled. A perfect recipe for a lazy weekend!

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February 11th, 2014

Gaufres de liège with sweet Starter

Category Cake & Pastry Tags: Sweet starter, Zucker 10 Responses

I feed my sweet starter at least once a week to ensure that it keeps it mild flavour and it strength. But what to do with the excess starter if there is no need for bread, baguette or Germknödel?

In this case waffles are always a good idea. And I have a soft spot for Gaufres de liège and so I changed my recipe to fit in sweet starter instead of yeast. But be aware that kneading egg and butter under the starter can be a little bit messy. If you want to keep clean hands, a mixer is maybe a better solution.

The waffles taste as good as the original ones, maybe even better due to the preferment. The only problem I face now is that I have to find a new waffle maker. The plastic of my cheap one started to break into pieces. So if you have any suggestions for a good waffle maker?

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February 5th, 2014

Poppy seed Pastries

Category Cake & Pastry Tags: Apple, Poppy seeds, Streusel, Sweet starter 12 Responses

Before I decided to bake a nut cake for a spontaneous family meeting last saturday I planned to bake poppy seed pastry later the same day. I already mixed my sweet starter for the dough. But seeing my sisters family and my parents were more important and so I placed the well risen starter in the fridge instead.

The next morning I checked the starter and it smelled and tasted terrific with a complex but mild flavour. And so I decided that I would use it as I would use a Pâte Fermentée. It added a good flavour to the dough, and together with some yeast it helps to give the dough a good oven spring. And with a soft poppy seed filling and some applesauce and crunchy streusel it is a delicious Sunday afternoon treat.

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January 26th, 2014

Baguette with sweet Starter

Category hand kneaded, Overnight Tags: Baguette, Hand kneaded, Sweet starter, Über-Nacht 50 Responses

I planned to post about a potato bread today (something I will do later this week) but the result of an experiment I baked this weekend made me so enthusiastic that I could not wait to share the recipe with you!

It is a recipe for a baguette made with sweet starter – a very active but not sour sourdough – and a 24 hours rise in the fridge. The Idea to this baguette came to me when I taste a little bit sweet starter which I kept in the fridge for some days. The complexity of the flavour was fascinating. Despite the time the sourdough spent in the fridge it did not taste tangy or acidic. It has a mild flavour of lactic acid, like you would expect it in crème fraiche. Beside that I could taste fruity tones and slight alcoholic taste due to the high activity of the yeast. It was a taste I wanted to catch in a bread!

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January 18th, 2014

Germknödel with sweet Starter

Category Cake & Pastry, Dessert, hand kneaded Tags: Hand kneaded, Poppy seeds, Sweet starter, Vanilla 15 Responses

I’m keep my little sweet starter which I created for baking pandoro in the fridge for nearly a month now. I feed him once a week with one part flour and half a part water and let him rise at 30°C for 3-4 hours, until its volume doubles. This keeps the starter very active, but slowly the acidity is coming back. And so I decided today to refresh him by feeding him three times every three hours (similar as described here), which removes the tangy taste.

But that left me with some very active sweet starter which I didn’t want to throw away. And so I mixed it with some flour, milk, eggyolk, butter and sugar to bake “Germknödel” . I needed some patient, because the dough took its time to rise, so I would advice to use 5g fresh yeast to speed up the process if you are a little bit in hurry! I steamed most of them, but cooked some in water as well. Both worked fine, but like always I prefer the steamed version!

The Germknödel have very good flavour with some complex notes due to the starter but without any acidic tones! A delicious dessert or (that what we do) great treat on a lazy saturday afternoon!

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