To not understand sourdough starters and how the world works?

And yoghurt is gone-off milk

I discard regularly to keep my starter in good shape. The discard makes lovely crackers.

Also, you will suffer zero ill effect from eating a bit of shop-bought bread that has a little bit of blue or green mould on it. You might not like it but it really won't harm you. (Although, of course, bread mould is different from the live yeasts that are in a sourdough culture... you don't make the distinction.)

See, this is why paying attention in GCSE Biology was a GOOD idea ...

OP, do you eat cheese? yoghurt? drink beer? wine? kefir? Where do you stand on kimchi or sauerkraut? What about shop-bought bread which has also had a fermenting agent in it?

See now I’ve had to google and oh no, just no 😬🤢

Just wait until you discover Surströmming and Hákarl.

I honestly wished I'd known about the benefits of things like kefir/natural/Greek yoghurt before last year - I got a horrible stomach bug which caused me quite a few issues afterwards, but regularly eating any of those seemed to really help settle it down. It even seems to help with when I'm feeling very anxious, somehow...

Yeah I don’t understand mouldy cheese or uncooked fish either 🤢

yes i just add to it. i only discard some if my jar is more than half full, to allow space for it to double in size.

God I love sourdough. Our local bakery sourdough bread is just magnificent. Then it should be at £4.75 a loaf.

I make Kefir - leave milk to ferment with kefir grains on the counter.

Yogurt - similar.

Saukraut...similar.

And like a poster above I've been looking up Crowdie....

This.

Our local cafe even does sourdough croissants & they’re awful.

Soda bread was traditionally made with soured milk. Nowadays people use buttermilk but I can attest soured milk is delicious and not weird tasting. There is a whole movement to increase fermented foods in our diets because they are good for gut health. Personally love some kimchi.

Just to be boring, it's not just the bacteria in food that can be harmful. It's the toxins the emit as they live (or when they die) that are also harmful.

Not really an issue for sourdough. But the TL;DR is that cooking isn't the magic wand some think it is.

(This is one of the things I learned in later life that completely changed my behaviour).

I actually always foumd it interesting fermenting is not common at all in UK to a point people think kefir is a modern fad.
It's great preservation method

Many foods we eat have already gone through fermentations process or have some form of culture in it: yoghurt, wine, beer, cheese, bread of any description (made with yeast which is, essentially, what sourdough starter is anyway). More "exotic" options include kefir, kimchi, sauerkraut etc. Most of Eastern Europe will have eaten sauerkraut, fermented cucumbers, apples, and wild garlic and rye bread for most of their lives and seem perfectly fine.
And now I desperately want a fermented apple. Alas, the last time I came across one was at least 30 years ago at a food market in Moscow.

I didn't realise you don't have to discard, do you add to it but just not chuck half away?

I keep mine in the fridge and only discard when I'm making bread or once a week anyway but it still feels wasteful!

I don't discard either! People seem to think this is necessary, no it's just to make room in your jar.

I'm also a 'easy' sourdough baker and feed my starter by eye. Every loaf has been perfect.

One of the reasons it's healthier is because the yeast already breaks down certain carbohydrates in flour that are harder for the human digestive system to handle. So your own gut doesn't end up producing gas or inflammatory responses by trying to digest those carbs. Many people with gluten or carb intolerance can eat sourdough without issues. There is obviously still gluten inside, but a lot of other components are easier to digest.

The "fake bloom" is only relevant if you're trying to make your own starter from scratch. Somewhere during the first 2-5 days, your flour+water mixture will rise but it smells awful (like vomit or old socks). That's basically bacteria, mould etc. Somewhere in there, there's a tiny bit of yeast so you're trying to isolate that and encourage it to grow. So every day, you have to throw away 90% of the mixture which contains bacteria and germs, and then add fresh flour and water to the remaining part. It's easiest to tell by smell. A good starter when it's fully risen (with lots of visible bubbles inside) should smell clean and yeasty, like fresh bread. That's the best point to bake with. If it smells very unpleasant or sour (vinegar, wine, acetone, socks, farts) then it's obviously not good for baking. It can smell slightly sour like yoghurt which is still ok, but not ideal.

The whole point of discarding and feeding is to only keep a tiny bit of the yeast and replenish 90% of the starter with fresh ingredients that won't go bad within a day. I usually use a clean jar each time so you don't have old bits of starter mixing around. There are loads of guides online on how to feed a starter. That's the main reason sourdough starters don't go off because you are essentially replacing the entire mixture with fresh flour and water every 24 hours. If you leave a starter untouched at room temp for more than 2 days then it will definitely go bad. A starter can be stored in the fridge for much longer because the yeast essentially goes dormant and can't get displaced by bacteria as quickly. Though as a PP said, you can't bake with a refrigerated starter...you still have to take it out and revive the yeast inside by discarding and feeding at room temp.

Hang on, what?! The vinegar has a bit of mother in it?! Whose mother? Which bit of her? How did it get there? Is Mother ok???

I don’t understand!!!!

I also don't discard, and have a very very easy no- knead sourdough recipe that works fine. I think the sourdough men hobbyists like to overcomplicate things to make it sound more impressive.

Tim Spector says that people who make sourdough tend to have healthier gut biomes- not necessarily from eating the bread, as the lactobacillus culture has obviously been killed in the oven- but from getting it on their hands etc while baking.

I don't understand either but imo the more pertinent question is why everyone's pretending to like sourdough. Horrible stuff! 😂🤮

Seems like someone forgot their Biology classes! I buy Sourdough though ,wouldnt make it .(BM so labour intensive) took me all morning to make Foccacia bread !

My husband bakes sourdough most weeks and has been using the same starter for years, with no problems at all. My favourite one is the ciabatta. You have to keep the starter in the fridge and do the discard and feed process regularly.