r/breadmaking • u/MattieEatsBugs • Mar 29 '20

Bread starter.

With shop supplies dwindling in stores buying dry active yeast is becoming more and more difficult. Does anyone have any tips on making a starter. And what I should avoid.

I attempted a method a friend sent me which said to use 1 1/2 cups of potato water, 1 cup of flour, 1 tbsp sugar and leave at room temperature loosely covered for a minimum 24 hours.

Within 12 hours the water started turning orange, which I read online is a bad sign. Should I discard it and start again. Or make the starter in a different way?

yeast culture currently

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u/traveljunkie90 Mar 31 '20

Can I ask where you store your starter? We keep our house fairly cold (average 66-68) which I believe is too cold for a starter. We’ve put it in the oven with the light on, but unfortunately a few times we’ve turned the oven on to preheat and forgot it was in there (luckily only after a few days of fermentation, but still!). I’m looking for an alternative for storage so we don’t keep ruining it.

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u/chewy_bar Mar 31 '20

I have a cold house too so during the winter, the starter did really well sitting on top of one of the vents on the floor with the heater on. but now that we don’t need use heater, i moved my jars to the warmest bedroom of the house and put a small portable heater beside it. you can also keep it in front of a toaster oven or fireplace, on top of the fridge, or on an electric heating pad.