Sourdough Experiment

[sadie33]

I racked off my Honey Bear Bourbon into my boiler yesterday. I've been doing a lot of reading on yeast and I like the idea of growing it and using it again so I saved all the trub from my cask.

I was feeding my sourdough this afternoon and saw all that golden trub sitting there and thought- why not?

I fed my sourdough and divided it in half, kinda. I put a little less in one jar and toped it off with some of the HBB trub. I tried to get the very fine middle line where the nice live yeast should be hanging out. I kinda got a little of everything with my turkey baster (yes, sanitized).

The HBB sourdough is taking off way quicker then my regular one. Every time I feed my sourdough I'm going to do this and make a bread. A Honey Bear Bourbon Bread. Can't wait. I'll post how it comes out here.

Here's a picture of the reg sour dough and the HBB sour dough. The higher one on the right is the HBB. You can see it has a bit of golden color too.

HBB sourdough.JPG (11.18 KiB) Viewed 1211 times

[subbrew]

It makes sense the HBB dosed one would take off as you just added extra yeast. Less waiting for the yeast to multiply as when you normally feed a SD starter. Let us know if you can taste a difference in the bread.

I have been wanting to try the other way, use my sourdough starter as a yeast source for a bourbon. I have made beer using sourdough starter. It came out OK, used an amber ale recipe and it come out tasting like an English ale. Of course it had an infection so over time it started to turn sour. but for distilling it would not hang out all that long so the lacto infection would not be a big deal and might add to it. Figure if the SHTF and I cant buy yeast I can still make bourbon and beer.

[dukethebeagle120]

Hi,
It's been a long time since I've on HD but here I am.
This is a great topic.
All my whiskeys are fermented via a sourdough starter.
It ferments like a roaring train at 72f.
I have had this starter for 6 years
I only use it to make whiskey now.no more bread.
When not in use I freeze it.
It makes a very vigorous ferment..
But I haven't distilled in a year.
Time to make some whiskey

[dukethebeagle120]

Btw,
It's the malt in the hbb that's feeding your starter
That's why it's so bloated

[sadie33]

I was reading a thread in here one time where someone asked about using a sourdough starter, but it was never answered. I mentioned that I was interested in the same thing, but again, never answered.

I would love to know how you use your sourdough starter for your whiskey dukethebeagle.

Here is an updated picture, I had to move them to bigger containers. I usually do a double batch and freeze one. this time I will make a single batch from each starter. Can't wait to see if there is a taste difference and if it is a good one.

The HBB is on the left.

HBB sourdough next day.JPG (11.01 KiB) Viewed 1122 times

[Salt Must Flow]

A few years ago I made a wild yeast starter with wild blackberries. I never did anything with it, but it was cool to see the process. It will be interesting to see how your sourdough yeast starter works out.

[Demy]

I think there is a bit of confusion.... a mother yeast is a "spontaneous" ferment... if you add the trub you are transforming your mother yeast because you add commercial yeast, so it is normal for fermentation to take off. Great experiment but they are two different yeasts. I also made a "hybrid" yeast like yours to make some bread.

[sadie33]

I think there is a bit of confusion.... a mother yeast is a "spontaneous" ferment... if you add the trub you are transforming your mother yeast because you add commercial yeast, so it is normal for fermentation to take off. Great experiment but they are two different yeasts. I also made a "hybrid" yeast like yours to make some bread.

It's been so long since I started my sourdough starter I forgot I never did add yeast!!

[sadie33]

This came out AMAZING!! For the last feeding I used a bit of the "beer" that floated to the top. My mother in law made beer bread, I didn't really like it, but thought I would grab some of it when feeding.

The Honey Bear Bread always took off quicker, but the original always caught up. When I put them in the pans to rise, the Honey Bear wasn't as tall. I usually rise to an inch above my bread pans, sometimes a bit more.

When they came out of the oven, the Honey Bear was taller. I was running my stripping run on the last of my SBB rum, so I thought something quick out of the freezer would be nice for dinner. I took out my chicken and dumplings.

I sliced up both breads and served doing a blind taste test. My friend and I liked the Honey Bear better and my husband said they were both good.

You could taste a different flavor, but I couldn't really say what. It was just nice and pleasant. here are some pictures. the bummer is I don't have any more. I will have to wait for my next batch of Honey Bear Bourbon. (maybe this coming week).

Honey Bear Bread rising on left.JPG (13.7 KiB) Viewed 1053 times

[Steve Broady]

I used some bourbon trub which had been sitting in the fermenter for a little over a month to start a sourdough starter. It’s been far more vigorous and flavorful than any attempt I’ve made in the past, even using bread yeast. I don’t know that I’ll keep feeding it more trub over time, but I would definitely use it again if I wanted to make a new starter. And I’ll bet that rum trub would have a great flavor!

But all this has me thinking. In a sourdough, the yeast are fermenting the uncooked, unconverted starch. Given enough time and protection from oxygen and infection, could you actually ferment an entire batch of beer without any malt or enzymes? I’m tempted to try a little experiment.

[subbrew]

The yeast in sourdough is only fermenting the sugars in the grain and sugar added. I add a bit of honey to my sourdough bread. It is not breaking down and fermenting the long chain starches. But it doesn't need to, it only needs a little sugar to make enough C02 to raise the bread.