Levain refreshed, dough

At first I was like,

And then I was like,

Yesterday the levain was shown near the beginning of a peak of activity, but its peak is not very peaky because the batch is not doubled, it is merely fed and kept alive. 

Cruel, I know, but it makes the difference between keeping a Russian wolfhound for a pet or a Chihuahua. I live in a downtown apartment not a bakery. There are other things going on around here so there are compromises made, shortcuts taken, an individual style that developed that makes all this fit.

The dough was kneaded half heartedly to bring it together and to initiate the gluten unraveling. I do not want the yeast to grow if I can keep it back for awhile so that the bacteria has a chance to outgrow it, that's how I visualize what is happening in there. Salt is added to assist the retardation and so I don't forget it later. If it does grow while cold I hope not much so that it still has that power reserved when things warm up again. I intend to help it with warmth when the fermentation period is finished. 

So yesterday was the near the beginning of a peak and this is the same levain shown yesterday having already peaked and sitting there waiting to be fed. 

Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Like I said before I am an irresponsible pet owner, poor thing almost died, then finally fed again. And this time really doubled like it deserves to be. Except it's been divided into two parts and taken two entirely different roads.

So presently, if levain were pet dogs, I have a chihuahua and a Russian wolfhound.

If only I would show the thing at peak activity, wouldn't that then show everything? 

That's the same thing I thought when shown pictures of cell division. They never caught the process at the precise moment that the words given to each phase described. The process is a beautiful sequence and the words describe each peak but the photos are showing the part in between the peaks and so not accurately described at all, they didn't come close to matching. 

The levain grows and peaks in activity when fed then falls back and settles. If fed at the peak, and doubled at feeding, then the peaks go: 

peak peak PEAK PEAK PEAK  

So now the levain is knocked back to being a chihuahua and the bulk is sent off to becoming bread. This is in anticipation of running out of bread within a few days.