Ask Allie

What is “Ask Allie”?

Ask Allie is our fermenting-related advice column, where you can ask all your fermenting, cooking, baking, and pantry-related questions to get digestible answers! No question about food is off limits!

Due to the overwhelming volume of submissions currently, I will be answering more than 3-4 questions each week until I don’t lag more than a week behind during the pandemic. Many of you will also get an email from me as soon as I see your submission, if I think your question needs an immediate reply.

For those of you who are still having some trouble finding the activation pages, please use this link for those pages. “Where are my activation instructions” is the one question I am no longer answering when it’s submitted, because we have links for it all over the website now, including the announcement section (where you get the promo codes) at the top of the homepage. Don’t forget, also, that if you’re having any sort of trouble, you should first check both the activation pages and the FAQ pages. All of the most common troubleshooting needs are addressed in those documents.

To have your question answered in Ask Allie posts, please use the form on our website. If you prefer to be anonymous, just say so in the form and we’ll leave your name out when we answer it in the blog!

For troubleshooting active issues with a culture you’re working with, please write us at support@positivelyprobiotic.com - you’ll get your answer faster that way!

Can I use the sourdough starter instead of yeast to make bread. If so exactly how do I do it? What would the process be, using the starter instead of combining yeast and warm milk? Thank you!

— Linda

Since you’re new to sourdough, I recommend focusing on recipes that are written for sourdough initially, such as this Kamut loaf. Keep an eye on the blog, too, because almost every recipe that comes out on Wednesdays will be sourdough-related for the foreseeable future. Not all, but most, since that’s what most people need right now. You can use any sourdough starter for any sourdough recipe, but if you’re doing a gluten-free one there will be adjustments and you should use a recipe specific to that. 

Generally speaking, though, the standard ratios used for converting a volumetric recipe (however many cups of whatever v. weight) is to replace 3/4c of flour and ½c of water with 1c of sourdough starter. You skip the blooming you’d normally do with active dry yeast (mixing it with warm water or milk and letting it get bubbly before adding) because your sourdough starter is essentially liquid yeast already. If you measure with a scale (and I hope you will, because truly it’s easier/more accurate if you’re not a “by feel” baker), you will “remove” equal weights of flour and water from the recipe and replace it with that weight of starter. So for example, if a recipe calls for 100g of starter, you’d do that and take out 50g of the flour the recipe calls for and 50g of whatever liquid (milk, water, beer, kombucha, whatever).

I got a little too much water when I started my sourdough starter, but I kept going. Step 2 looked great and step 3 looked great. I’m a little late doing step 4 and my starter has separated. It’s 1/2 flour mixture and 1/2 cloudy water. Do I stir it up and keep going or what?

— Elizabeth

Yep, you stir it up and keep going! You may want or need to short the liquid on the next addition, if you’re not doing your feeds where you discard each time.

Just got my starter. When I make the actual bread, do I need to have bread flour?

— Many of you

Y’all can use any flour that’s accessible to you right now for any type of starter. If you want to make sure there’s a “pure” starter to do as originally intended, once stores are full up again, go on ahead and save half of the packet in the freezer until that time.

I am new to making yogurt and would like to get better at it. I'd like a creamy, thick, somewhat sweet (not tart) texture and taste, ideally. My first time on your website and there are so many types to choose from (I narrowed it down to Thermophilic). Is there a way to search your site by texture or could you please recommend a starter culture that most likely will yield the above preferences? Curious how many days to ship to ———?  I've got milk to use in a week or so. I thought I read that I can freeze excess starter for future use. Is that correct for all starters (thermophilic, sourdough, etc.) and if so, how long would it last?Thank you Allie!

— Lesli

All thermophils should be thick, and can be strained to increase thickness as needed. In terms of flavor, we have a What’s Your Flavor? feature on the website, which will tell you which products best fit which tastes!

My guess is that it shouldn’t take but a couple of days; three at the most. While I’m in Texas, Sabrina is in southern California (she does all production and distribution), so you can more easily make an educated guess based on where you are relative to her. All orders that come in by noon PST will go out that same day, too!

That said, if you start to worry about the milk souring, just tuck it in the freezer until you’re ready to ferment (make sure there’s headspace). Milk freezes fine, and it makes great yogurt after thawing!

It’s not true of kombucha or jun, and if I had to guess, vinegar starters. Everything else can be frozen, though. How long it lasts depends on how you are storing it. If you’re using random container tucked in the door of the freezer, I’d assume 3 months. A reusable container suitable for freezing should tell you on the label (or maybe bottom of container) how long goods stay good while frozen in the containers, but I would assume at least 12 months (and this is true in my experience as well).

Breast milk bag in back of freezer or in deep freeze? Minimum 1 year. I recently started some yogurts that I’d had frozen in breast milk bags for 2 or 3 years in my fridge’s freezer, and they were fine. I started them to make sure they were fresh before I dried and stored them. Wet stuff takes more space than dry in this context, and I need the space. Yep, they were fine. Target Up and Up brand makes the best breast milk bags (lowest rate of failure), in my experience, and for the best price. Breast milk bags also freeze flat, which is lovely.

If you need to dry some of whichever culture, spread it thinly on either a plastic bowl/plate/tray or on something like that with parchment paper. I find that using a plastic dish of some kind is easier, in addition to being waste-free, because it self-detaches for the most part, allowing you to just break it up, grind or not into powder (I rarely do unless it’s a lot), and store.

Sooooo...I purchased your San Francisco sourdough starter and am on day 4. I neglected to measure out 50 g of starter and added my 50 g flour and 50 g water. Is it ruined? Do I have to start over?

— Patricia

Noooooooo, Patricia, it’s not ruined at all! The ideal is to do it daily, but I’m not going to pretend that I don’t have starters that have been adapted through neglect to wait a week between feedings at room temp. Skipping a day is fine when it happens, although you hopefully will not train the starter to expect it! Just proceed as usual and don’t worry about making up for the day you missed.