Rye berries looking like grains of rice

The active bubbly starter with chunky bits of the rye chops

Rye Starter

I chanced upon some organic rye berries  recently. It was something new and this was a chance for me to play with building a new sourdough culture. The rye berries were ground up and some water was added into the container. It was able to double without any additional flour. Since it was active and well, I fed it with a teaspoon of flour and it doubled in 3 hours. The starter had a very pleasant aroma and it looks promising for making some sourdough loaves out of it. I have never started  a culture with rye berries so it would be interesting to see how this new culture works out.

I had cultured a starter out of organic wheat berries before and it was so easy to make that I did not even bother maintaining the culture. Instead, I maintained my Carl's sourdough culture faithfully. This was more for sentimental reasons than for the fact that it was reputed to be 150 years old. It was sent over the mail to me by Charles Perry from Carl's friends and I received invaluable advice from him.