My sourdough starter went from bubbly to dead in 4 days flat

I fed it organic rye flour at 1:1:1 ratio every 12 hours like always, but after I left town for a weekend it got this weird pink spot on top by Monday morning. I tried scraping it off and feeding it fresh but now it smells like nail polish remover instead of sour. Has anyone else brought a starter back from pink mold or should I just dump it and start over?

2 comments

2 Comments

amymartinez16d ago

Dumping a starter feels like a breakup with extra steps honestly. I murdered my first three starters before I got one that didn't try to die on me. That pink mold is bad news though, trust me on this one. Nail polish smell means it's starving or infected too. Just start a new one and pretend the old one went to a farm upstate.

sage_lewis1016d ago

Honestly this whole comment kinda shifted how I look at it. I used to think dumping a starter was just wasteful, like you're giving up on free food. But @amymartinez you got me thinking about how the pink mold and that nail polish smell really are red flags you can't fix. I had a starter once that smelled like acetone for a week and I kept feeding it thinking it would bounce back. Nope, it just got worse and started looking fuzzy. Next time I'll just toss it and start fresh instead of playing zombie nurse with a jar of dead flour.