Foraging for Wild Yeast
(Page 2 of 6)
September/October 1980
By the Mother Earth News editors
A homegrown leavening "factory" was made by simply combining equal amounts of flour and water, and then allowing the mixture to sour in an earthenware pot for anywhere from 3 to 6 days . . . after which—if the prospector was lucky enough to "catch" some yeast—the dough would become a bubbling mass with a pleasant, slightly alcoholic aroma.
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From then on, the "ferment" was kept growing by constant use and subsequent replenishment of the flour and water. A prospector would protect the brewing mass from the belowfreezing northern temperatures by wrapping the sourdough crock in his bindle . . . and the miners were even known to dangle the earthenware pots in pouches around their necks, and then tuck the fragrant cultures under their long johns to keep the yeasty concoctions alive with body heat. (And, the legends go on to say, if the winter winds howled too fiercely, some gold seekers would hole up in their cabins and slurp down the nectarous liquid-or "hooch"-that formed on the surface of a well-fermented pot of starter. The potent brew would send the trainer on a bender that sometimes went on until the weather cleared!)
It's no wonder, then, that the sour starter soon lent its peculiar homebrew aroma to a prospector's cabin and clothing . . . and to his (or, in rare instances, her) own personal body odor as well, Eventually the starter—and the bread it produced—became so well-known that the gold miners themselves took on the name of "sourdoughs".
Well, most of the folklore that the biochemist related was new to me, but I had read about old-timers collecting the bark of certain trees to gather the dough-doubling plants. It had never occurred to me, however, to forage for yeast myself . . . probably because of the ready availability—and low price—of the packeted commercial product, combined with the lack of time to cook with sourdough in today's rushed living pace. But being in the middle of the forest, with plenty of time on my hands (and lots of motivation), I set my sights on producing a batch of wild yeast sourdough.
A BACKWOODS BAKERY
It was easy to spot the powdered blue berries of the Oregon grape (Berberis aquifolium), a fall-ripening hollylike evergreen shrub that grows profusely in the mountain ranges of the Pacific coastal area . . . and in no time at all we had collected dozens of the miniature fruits.
To prepare the "sponge", we simply put a handful or two of the berries in a quart jar, added 2 cups of whole wheat flour, and stirred in 2 cups of lukewarm water. Next we loosely screwed the lid onto the container . . , to allow the gas from the fermenting process to escape, yet—at the same time—to protect the yeast culture from contamination. Then, after placing the starter jar on firewarmed rocks, we merely waited for the prolific yeast to multiply. (One zealous member of the group even slept with the culture, to keep it properly heated during the night! )
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