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Stock Yeast

A liquid yeast starter made by boiling hops, scalding flour, adding malt, sugar, and yeast, then fermenting for 36–48 hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Stock Yeast

Ingredients

Directions

Make the hop liquor

  1. Boil hops in water for 1 hour.

  2. Strain the hops.

Make the starter

  1. Pour some water over flour to scald it.

  2. Cool the mixture until boil warm.

  3. Rub the scalded flour fine.

  4. Add the rest of the hop liquor.

  5. Add malt and sugar.

  6. Cool until lukewarm.

  7. Add yeast.

  8. Let it stand undisturbed for 36 to 48 hours.

  9. Store in a cool place for up to a month.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  2. Malt + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together325 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Flour + malttop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together260 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Hops + flourtop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  5. Hops + sugartop 43% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Hops
Adds bitterness and aroma that balance the sweetness of the malt.
Flour
Scalded flour thickens the mixture and supplies starches that yeast can work on.
Malt
Supplies sugars that feed the yeast and give the starter its flavor.
Sugar
Provides quick-acting sugar that feeds the yeast during fermentation.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars, producing carbon dioxide that leavens and flavors the starter.

The step that matters

Cool to lukewarm before adding yeast. Yeast is killed by high heat, so adding it to liquid that is still hot can stop fermentation before it starts. Cooling to lukewarm keeps the cells alive and active.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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