Cookbook talk:San Francisco Sourdough Bread

If I remember correctly, the San Francisco sourdough yeast came from local berries. So the entry might be expanded to mention that other edible berries can work as well as grapes. The white powder on the outside of many thin-skinned fruits and berries is wild yeast.


 * As far as I know, san francisco starters don't use grapes. The yeast and etc necessary for the distinictive sourdough flavor are floating around in the air.


 * It is not necessary to use grapes because, as you quite correctly point out, there is always wild yeast in the air and on everything around one, but my references (which I will try to find and include as a footnote) stated that the original recipes used grapes. Mike Hayes (talk) 02:55, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

What kind of covered container should you use for the starter? If you use a tight lid wouldn't there be problems with gas exchange, wouldn't the yeast loose effectiveness from lack of oxygen? If you use a cloth or some kind of breathable cover would it become infected?


 * One never uses an airtight container in any kind of fermentation. We are not writing a book for children. I have edited my recipe appropriately for those who cannot work it out for themselves. Mike Hayes (talk) 02:55, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

The author's comments on edits by User:MetricCook
The trouble with MetricCook changing everything so that metric units always precede avoirdupois, is that it is not immediately apparent in which units the recipe was originally written. This is not an unimportant point. The original units should precede the conversions in all cases, as far as I am concerned, because conversions are usually cumbersome and, more importantly, the person doing the conversion may have been inaccurate. Furthermore, most of the conversions attempt to convert precisely. An expert does the conversion in such a way that one does not end up with idiotic measurements like 237 ml of water and 483 grams of flour. This sort of amateurish nonsense should be secondary to the original units. Some of my recipes are written in metric units with imperial second because metric is the way I received the original recipe. This, I believe is a sensible and rational policy. This will ensure consistency whereas MetricCook's system, which is intended to achieve it, will have exactly the opposite effect and create a mess. Mike Hayes (talk) 03:25, 4 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Mike I do not know where you get off dissing my comments on using Metric first in all recipes. What the hells your problem? Wiki have made it widely know that they fully support using Metric as the first priority followed by Imperial units if needed. There are 6.4 BILLION Metric users vs. only .3 Billion Imperial users. Why should you forcing extremely small minority, America, who uses imperial units, on the whole world that comes to this site? It seams to me you are a bit of an egoist. If the recipe was in Imperial unit 'originally', so what! The original Imperial unit simply follow the Metric units. PLEASE STOP MAKING MOUNTAINS OUT OF MOLE HILLS.

I have explained very clearly what I am talking about. I am talking about errors in conversion and for the need for it to be obvious which was the original recipe. I have no intention of explaining it again for someone who lacks the capacity to understand it. Wiki policy about metric refers to articles in the main encyclopaedia, not to the COOKBOOK. In books written before the metric system was invented, do publishers place the metric equivalents before the original units when reprinting an old book? Of course not, the modern equivalent is placed in parentheses after the original. This is only common sense. It is not your place to change the way another author chooses to write his recipes. If you don't like the way someone else has written a recipe, write your own. It was YOU who started the dispute by initiating this ill-considered idea in the first place. Mike Hayes (discuss • contribs) 00:06, 3 April 2011 (UTC)