How to make yeast for bread, pizza, and other leavened products at home? The so-called Lievito Madre.
If you start dusting an old grandmother’s recipes, you will certainly find the “Lievito Madre” recipe.
How you make it? Very simple !!!
We only need 2 ingredients and a little patience at the beginning since it needs the care of a child to make it grow.
Lievito Madre is a fermented dough in which bacteria and lactic ferments develop naturally: it is a yeast with very particular characteristics, ideal for the preparation of bread, pizza, focaccia.
The cures are called “rinfreschi” (refreshers) in Italian.
How to make yeast at home? Lievito Madre
Ingredients
- 120 g organic flour 1 cup
- 60-80 ml of water
Instructions
- Mix water and flour at room temperature.
- Form a soft and homogeneous ball.
- With a knife cut the upper part of the cross-shaped ball (my grandmother always did).
- Put the ball in a tall and long glass container, cover it with transparent paper (pierce the film with a toothpick).
- Store it at room temperature in a dry place for 48 hours ( near apples to favor fermentation more).
After 48 hours:
- Take the ball out of the container, if the upper part is dry remove it.
- Weigh it and mix it with the same quantity of flour and half of water.
- Example: 100g of leavened dough (3.5 oz) 100g of flour (7/8 cup) 50-70 ml of water
- Make it again a soft and homogeneous ball, make on the surface again a cross, and put it back in the jar, washed only with water (do not use detergent), leave it there for 48 hours.
- Repeat these steps ("rinfreschi") at least 3 times every 48 hours.
- Then repeat the refreshes 24 hours apart for 7 days always following the usual procedure.
- At this point, the lievito madre should be ready and we can use it.
- It means that it has reached the right strength to triple after 4 hours of leavening at a temperature of 26-27 °C (78-80°F)
- If you’re having complications, continue to refresh until it has reached its rising strength.
How to keep it:
- Put in the fridge in its closed jar not tightly because it has to breathe, and refresh it every 5-6 days.
- Take it out of the fridge and keep it out until it has reached room temperature, refresh it following the general rule, that is, weigh it and add the same amount of flour as the leavened dough (remove the dry part), half of the water and knead to form the usual ball engraved with a cross on top.
- Let it rest for 2 hours and put it back in the fridge.
How to use lievito madre:
- If you have decided to make bread, pizza or any other leavening product.
- Get the "lievito Madre" out of the fridge.
- And keep it at room temperature for at least an hour.
- Refresh it down using the general rule and keep it at room temperature for 4-5 hours.
- Obviously, you have to keep out only the amount that you need, the remaining part you have to put back in the fridge.
- After that, you can use it.
So, the doses are:
- For 500g (~4 cups) of flour use 150g (5.3 oz) of Lievito Madre.
Notes
ENJOY!
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Thank you for posting a way of making a starter without discarding most of it and using the refrigerator to keep it. I have been doing the same thing for the last five years and get tired of seeing website posts that keep telling me I have to discard! What a waste!
You Are Welcome!