Sour Bakes As Sour Is: Bad Bagels And The Rebuild Of The Sourdough Starter

I now admit that I have been bereft of bagel-baking skills. Three ... yes three ... failed bagel batches what do sink to the bottom of the boiling pan like stones... and never do float. Yes, I do think you have to make sure you know your flour as I do say when the first batch fails but now I admit there is more to the problem.

With the change to warmer weather it appears that my "starter leaven" have just excelled itself in sourness and have become like over-excitable battery acid. The Old Man pronounces that this be the problem. My starter fails to "start" raising my dough... it do become so acid it be the death of it.

Solution? The Old Man starts by tiffing out good quantity of the leaven and feeding it with plenty more flour and water. I decide to keep it in the fridge rather than the kitchen porch. We do work like this for several days until the texture thicker and bubbly (it have gone thin and bubbly).

Yesterday I do make bagels again but do not worry about the overnight chilling of the shaped bagels in the fridge. I just do go for it and boil and bake when they do look ready. The Old Man thinks these are the best yet... though my confidence be shot and I don't know. But for sure the little darlings buzzed around the top of that boiling pan like water beetles... They ain't for sinking. Good news is we's back on track and a sharp eye will be kept on the starter during the summer.

I do wonder if I do curse my leaven with my constant current anger ... I have sometime said of people they be so sour they do curdle their milk. Well I think I may have become so sour that I have turned my leaven into acid and sunk me bagels!