The day a customer asked me to add sourdough starter to her cake mix

I had this lady come into my shop last month wanting me to dump a cup of her homemade sourdough starter into a boxed cake mix. She said it makes it fluffier. Has anyone else heard of this trick or am I just old fashioned about using straight baking soda?

3 comments

3 Comments

charlies3711d ago

Did she say how long she's been doing this or where she picked it up? I can't see how dumping a live culture into a box mix would do anything but mess with the chemical leaveners already in there. Sourdough needs time to develop flavor and structure, which a boxed cake just isn't designed for. Seems like it would come out dense and weird.

erickelly11d ago

Tried something similar last summer with a vanilla box mix... I let the sourdough starter sit in the batter for about an hour before baking. Actually came out pretty good, not too dense. Had to add a little extra liquid though to balance it out.

stella_scott9611d ago

And honestly with box mixes the extra liquid is key. I've been tossing a half cup of fed starter into yellow cake mix for a couple years now and the extra moisture actually helps with the texture. The starter eats some of the sugar and that can throw off the sweetness though so I usually add a tablespoon of honey to compensate. If you let it sit too long the baking soda in the mix starts working too early and you lose all the rise. Forty five minutes is the sweet spot.