I decided to make a couple of changes in the starter this morning based on what I’d been reading in the Tartine Bread book last night. I did find a brief mention of what the starter smells like and the sour vinegary smell is because the culture is leaning toward acetic acid production rather than lactic acid. He says that a warmer, wetter starter will move toward lactic acid production and smell more sweet and less sour.
Previously my process looked like this:
Every 12hrs:
30g reserved starter +
30g rye flour +
30g water =
90g (30% starter)
This morning I did this
20g reserved starter +
20g rye flour +
20g KA bread flour +
45g water =
105g (≈20% starter)
This is more like the 50/50 white/wheat mix he was talking about and is ≈110% hydration rather than 100%. It’s Friday so I’m probably getting home later than usual so we’ll see how the starter gets along with an extra three hours or so of fermentation time. If everything goes ok after a day or two of this I may just go ahead and switch to the default feeding schedule in the book.
Also, in the interests of science. The house, in A/C mode, is allowed to get to 80°F and probably has the last few days.