Fermentation Support Forum

Been making kefir from milk grains for eight years - successfully. Have often had some left over, especially in our summer when it ferments very quickly. An acquaintance said she had read about using overfermented kefir as a starter for sour dough.

I mixed a dough using about 300gm of plain flour, pinch of salt and kefir whey with a few curds, and left the bowl to stand in a zip-lock plastic bag in the pantry. After 24 hrs it had definitely risen, so I dropped a lump in my air fryer, and cooked it. It was "interesting" to say the least. An almost sour-dough ish taste. Would like to think it was healthy. Thoughts please.

Alison

Hi Alison,
I've tried several times to make a sourdough with home fermented kefir, with so-so results. The rise hasn't been great and it doesn't have the chewiness one expects of real sourdough. I found this discussion that seems to agree: https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/24164/kefir-sourdough-starter-initial-observations-and-concerns

They found that the extra long rise times seems to degrade the gluten, which is what I was suspecting. You could try letting your whey get extra sour and use shorter rise times (<4-5 hours). There are yeasts in the kefir that should be able to digest flour, but maybe not enough. You may need to add bread yeast to get the shorter rise times.

I gave up my trials this past winter and will try to make a starter the traditional way now that it's warmer.

Randy

There's someone on a FB group that has posted several photos of beautiful looking sourdough loaves! I make sourdough but have not tried to make Kefir sourdough yet. Sounds easy enough and looks really good!
Here's a link to a pic of her bread and then a link to a search on that group showing several loaves as well as loaves and recipes made by others and even scones, Banana Bread, Biscuits, muffins and Biscotti
https://www.facebook.com/groups/113571455136/search?q=sourdough

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