The Life of Ryely

December 12, 2025

You may have noticed that I’ve been playing around with some baking lately. Baking and brewing are kissin’ cousins, you know. I read a recipe for Norwegian farmhouse yeast, kviek, as follows:

4 liters water
125 grams hops
¾ Kg organic rye flour
¼ Kg sugar
40 grams salt

Now this looks suspiciously like a sourdough starter, so I gave I a shot. It turns out that wild yeast lives in rye grains, and using the organic flour preserves it. I reduced the recipe so I didn’t have a gallon of goo on the counter top, and removed the hops so I could bake bread, but it worked! There’s a trend of folks naming the sourdough starter that lives on their countertop. Meet Ryely!

Here’s a shot of the yeast bubbling away.

I baked two loaves of sourdough this evening, which came out pretty good. I used about half the starter. I replaced what I took with additional rye flour and some honey.

Next I’ll use the hops and make a yeast for brewing ale.

Bibliography:

Garshol, L. M. (2020). Historical Brewing Techniques: The Lost Art of Farmhouse Brewing. United States: Brewers Publications. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Historical_Brewing_Techniques/_KDgDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Historic%20Brewing%20Techniques&pg=PA103&printsec=frontcover

December 13, 2025

I got up this morning and Ryely was a big mess. The container had leaked a bit and everything was sticky. I moved it to a bowl, and washed out the container. I put it back and sealed the lid. It looks a lot cleaner now, and lighter in color.

The loaves I made yesterday were dark, like a rye bread, but I used white bread flour. That was from the stater. Today Ryely will rest. I think the jostling around may not be the best thing. As a brewer, I know that yeast development needs oxygen, but once it’s growing it doesn’t. I don’t want to stress the yeast. I will add some yeast nutrient tomorrow.