Yeast & Salt

I've been working on a Sourdough Bialy recipe, trying out several reputable recipes and replacing the store bought yeast with my living colony. One of my favorite resources for technical recipes (along with explanations), had a Bialy recipe, so I decided to give it a shot.

SPOILER - it failed miserably.

But why did it fail so completely? Well, gentle readers, it was because of something we've all been warned about over and over again, but I never took seriously. "Keep salt away from yeast, you might affect your rise."

I've ignored this advice and never had a problem.

Bialys, for a yeasted dough, contain a lot of salt. If you've never had one, they're kind of a cross between a pretzel and a bagel. And, this particular recipe, I believe had a misprint, asking for 2 tbsp salt instead of 2tsp. Combine this with the fact that sourdough starter doesn't have nearly the pop of store bought yeast, and the resulting dough just sat there no matter how long I waited or how I encouraged it. After 24 hours (yep, I let it go just to see what would happen), I got a few measly bubbles from a very active starter. I even cooked them, and they were little better than a salt lick.

My take-away from this is that you actually can damage your yeast with salt, BUT it seems to take a 3-5% salt by weight to do any real damage. So, I will continue to ignore the yeast/salt warning.. Except in heavily or moderately salted doughs when I'm using my starter.