The Sourdough Experiments: Day 5 - Oh Crepe!
It's getting closer and closer to having some viable sourdoughs, here. Time is running short to find Dutch Ovens [the real ones, not the bedroom prank] and Bannetons[aka "Proofing Baskets"]. I have some ideas where to obtain the former. None to get the latter. I might be making some sourdough muffin/buns as I begin. I dunno.
Anyway, today's experiment was all in seeing what would happen if I didn't add any flour at all. So here's what happened with that:
Here is today's harvests with the ingredients I originally planned to add:
- one large egg
- one tsp [equivalent] of pure Stevia powder [the green sachets]
- one tsp of xylitol [this proved to be a mistake, but not how you'd think]
- one generous dollop of cream
[I had the coconut milk just in case. I didn't actually end up using it]
I later added two to three pinches of psyllium husk because - surprising nobody - the resultant mixtures were sloppier than a soup sandwich.
"Pro" tip - some actual flour may be necessary for baking with sourdough harvests!
The resulting mix was very, VERY thin. So thin that I couldn't use the top heating plate on the sandwich press.
I could cook up to six little crepes on the hotplate or four big ones.
The bread flour ones turned out nicely, no matter how thin they were.
So, too, did the wholemeal ones.
Not so much, the almond meal ones. They broke apart because they had the structural integrity of a political promise.
Results:
- I think I put too much sweetener in there, maybe stick to one, or one and a half teaspoons (or equivalent) of your best sweetener
- Miss T loved them anyway and declared them "for nomming" [she means at-compy snackabobs]
- The almond meal cakelets had a kind of lemony flavour to them that might be the beginnings of almond meal sourdough personality
Extra things I have learned:
- Stirring your starter really deflates that thing!
- Almond meal and wholemeal starters are thirstier and require a third of a cup of water per half cup of "flour" just to get things mixed
- Sourdoughs take up WAY more time than I would have believed.
- Some form of flour is vital when using almond starter as structural integrity IS a problem