Right after I moved to London in 2013, Rose gave me a bit of her starter, which had come from Giuseppe Mascoli's family bakery in Ischia. Rose quotes Giuseppe in her book The Pocket Bakery: "The bakery in Ischia has it on record that it has been in use since 1790, but the bakers say there is no reason why it cannot date back to Roman times." (p.9)

Characteristics

My starter is pretty lively, she revives quickly and she keeps well when I'm not baking. The flavor of the bread is sweet, rarely sour and the culture is active - giving a good, fast rise for dough temperatures above 24C. It works well for lower dough temperatures - for proving in the fridge over night or for longer periods as well.

Viscocity

Taste & flavour

Recipe

Starting ingredients

50g Stone ground wheat
50g White wheat
100g Filtered water
50g Starter

Feeding ingredients

I follow the steps above rather than feed an existing starter in a jar - the 80F temp is the desired temp but it's often colder, down to 19C in my kitchen. it still works.

Working method

I either mill wheat I have on hand pretty fine or I use stoneground whole wheat flour organic if I can get it. I blend it with white flour.

50g Stone ground wheat 50g White wheat

In London, i run tap water through a Britta filter. In colder months, I'll mix water boiled in the kettle to get a water temp of 80F or so.

100g Filtered water

Starter from my most recent batch lives in the fridge until I need it. If it's mouldy or dry on top, I dig down below the top layer to find the pinker stuff. I dissolve the starter into the water, then mix the flour into the starter. I leave the result in a covered bowl on the counter.

50g Starter

I start checking my starter mixture at 4 hours. Once it is bubbly on the top and slightly domed, it's ready to use. If the starter hasn't become bubbly overnight, I start again with steps 1-3 using 50 grams of the new mixture as the starter and check after 4 hours etc.

Once the starter is on a 4-6 hour cycle, I either scale it up to the size I need plus 50 grams or more or I use what I need from the existing mixture. While the bread is baking, I make a batch following steps 1-3 again using the leftover starter from the most recent batch and either put it on the counter or in the fridge depending on when I need it next.