Read my Name. FriscoFrankie, yeah San Francisco; famous for it's hippies, gay politics and above all (in my book) SourDough Bread. Above all things I miss about the living back home sourdough bread, biscuits and pancakes sit at the top of the list.

Now, there are a few recipes out on the net on building a sourdough starter, some (most?) involve a "packet of yeast." Now, that's just fukin' sacrilegious! Why in the hell do you want to use some domesticated and dormant yeast off the shelf? No true flavor enhancement. It ain't SourDough.


Breads, like beers derive thier unique flavors from the different strains of yeast used to make them. Why is San Francisco SourDough so highly regarded? One of teh biggest reasons is the local yeast spores caught by the akers so many years ago. These yeast colonies thrive in the temperate conditions of the area.

In order to make a decent sour dough bread, you've got to choose your bait and go fishin for a yeast that will render a nice tangy flavor, packaged yeasts are fine for putting air bubbles in the bread, but very little flavor. They may not live long or very well in our topical clime and your starter may mold or die.

Best to capture some local spores and start your own colony. Each locality will have different strains and at different time of the year you may find one strain is more active in the air than an other. Few years ago, living in bangkok I inadvertantly caught a crisp and tangy colony in a pot of over-cooked rice, I was a week from moving and had to let it go. Since that day I've waited for my own kitchen to try and catch one equally tangy up here.

Like Taj Mahal says, "many fish bites if ya got good bait." let's talk about bait. You need to have some sterile (boiled) water for sure and start with a scrupulously clean vessel (like beer we don't want mold contaminating our culture). But, what do you add from there? add flour to the consistency of pancake dough and see what happens? you could do that.

Or you could peel some old mealy potatoes chop 'em up and boil them away to nothing add water and flour to the above consistency and wait a couple days. 'Bout twenty years ago I had a starter started in this way, tangy with a touch of fruitiness I kept that culture going for three years, great bread.

This time out, being in Asia, I though I'd try and catch some rice eatin' yeasts. So I started with four/five cups water and a cup of sticky (glutenous) rice.


Throw it all in the pot, and set it to simmer for good long while, although the rice needn't diaappear completely; the closer to gone your patience will allow, the better.


You'll need to tend it a bit, adding water as needed, if you're using stainless cookware, as I am, you need to stir it up to keep from scroching the bottom and getting that crispy stuff on the bottom.

Now, remember; you can use potatoes for this if you like this the "ol' sourdough way" and it gives pretty good results. Different bait different spores (maybe) different flavor.
When that's cooked as long as you're willing to wait but at least to the musy as hell stage, take teh pot off teh fire and pour your gruel into a clean glass or plastic bowl or crock. Now you can wait for it to cool, or not, mix one cup clean water with one cup all-purpose flour and mix that in. By waiting for the mess to cool to say 80 deg F. you may be introducing yeast spores living on the flour into the mix and predefining your starter from the get-go. I added the flour/water mixture right away.
Looked like this:


now cover this with cheese-cloth ("Pa Khao") nad forgt it for a coupla days.
When I get back I'll show y'all what it looks like after a couple days.