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My starter quit at 5am on a 4 loaf order, and a cup of rye flour in Dayton got it going again
Back in late January I took an order for 4 sourdough loaves from a cafe near my place in Dayton, and the night before pickup my starter went flat and smelled like nail polish. I fed it rye flour instead of my usual bread flour around 5am and by 8 it was doubling again. The loaves came out fine, but I still don't know if the rye did the trick or if the starter just needed a longer feed. Has anyone else had a starter act up like that, and did switching flours really help or was it something else?
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reesepatel6d ago
Used to figure the flour swap was just luck, that a starter is a starter and any feed would do the trick. Then mine pulled the same stunt before a big bake and a switch to rye got it roaring back way faster than my regular flour ever did. Now I'm convinced rye is doing something real, those extra nutrients in the bran seem to wake up the yeast when it's sluggish. That nail polish smell you had is usually a sign the starter got too warm or went too long between feeds, so the rye may have just given it the kick it needed alongside a fresh meal. Still, timing matters too, since a hungry starter will bounce back on any flour once you finally feed it. Worth testing both ways next time so you know for sure what did the work.
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