How to make sourdough starter

Learn how to make a bubbling sourdough starter using white bread flour and water. After feeding the starter for five days, you can use it to make a sourdough loaf

Ingredients

• 250g strong white bread flour , preferably organic or stoneground

Method

• STEP 1

Day 1:
To begin your starter, mix 50g flour with 50g tepid water in a jar or, better still, a plastic container. Make sure all the flour is incorporated and leave, semi-uncovered, at room temperature for 24 hrs.

Day 2:
Mix 50g flour with 50g tepid water and stir into yesterday’s mixture. Make sure all the flour is incorporated and leave, semi-uncovered, at room temperature for another 24 hrs.

Day 3:
Mix 50g flour with 50g tepid water and stir into yesterday’s mixture. Make sure all the flour is incorporated and leave, semi-uncovered, at room temperature for another 24 hrs.

Day 4:
You should start to see some activity in the mixture now; there should be some bubbles forming and bubbling on top. Mix 50g flour with 50g tepid water and stir into yesterday’s mixture. Make sure all the flour is incorporated and leave, semi-uncovered, at room temperature for another 24 hrs.

Day 5:
The mixture should be very active now and ready for making your levain (starter). If it’s not bubbling, continue to feed it on a daily basis until it does. When it’s ready, it should smell like yogurt.

You now have a starter, which is the base to the bread. You’ll need to look after it, but naming is optional! Keep it in the fridge (it will stay dormant) and 24 hrs before you want to use it, pour half of it off and feed it with 100g flour and 100g water. Leave it at room temperature and it should become active again. The longer the starter has been dormant, the more times it will need to be refreshed – the process of pouring off half the starter and replacing it with new flour and water – to reactivate. If your starter is ready to use, a teaspoonful of the mixture should float in warm water.
The starter can now be used to make white sourdough bread.

RECIPE TIPS

SOURDOUGH MASTERCLASS

Join us on Friday 3 July at noon for an expert sourdough masterclass with Barney Desmazery. Book your tickets now.

Here’s how to get started with wild yeasts.

It seems that home bakers everywhere are showing off their sourdough loaves. These breads, with their burnished, dark crusts and chewy crumbs, were made with a live starter, a wet paste of flour and water that it is bubbly enough to create the leavening needed to bake a loaf of bread. The existing wild yeasts and bacteria in flour can be encouraged to thrive through regular feedings of warm water and flour. This ancient way of raising a dough is what people used long before commercial yeast was developed. When that arrived, it made baking more reliably consistent and convenient. But lately the pleasures and digestibility of eating naturally leavened breads have been rediscovered with a passion.

Most people say the best way to get a starter is from a friend. They can also be mail-ordered, and will arrive in dehydrated or fresh form: King Arthur Flour has fresh starter and Bien Cuit offers a sourdough starter kit that includes flour, tools, and a jar of starter. But if you want to make your own starter, just how do you get started?

Creating a Natural Culture

Making a sourdough starter takes about one week, but it can sometimes take longer. Begin by stirring a paste of equal amount of flour and water together in a jar and letting it sit in a warm room, stirring, and feeding at regular intervals. That’s the beginning of it all. Once you’ve created and are caring for a starter it can last for quite some time. Several years ago, a group of food editors in the Martha Stewart test kitchen created a starter by following the method used by Chad Robertson of Tartine Bakery as used in his Tartine Country Bread.

The success of that starter, which they named Ladybird, has encouraged many current and former Martha Stewart food editors to carry on the tradition. Currently, Sarah Carey, Lauryn Tyrell, Greg Lofts, Lucinda Scala Quinn, and I are maintaining and baking with Ladybird starter progeny. With it we make the Tartine Country Bread and many other delicious things. Although a starter is only made from equal parts of flour and water, there are a few important details to keep in mind.

The Flour

Any type of flour will work, but never use bleached flour. A blend of white flour with a whole grain wheat or rye will give a more complex flavor to your dough; also those whole flours have more microbial content for the yeasts to feed upon.

The Container

Choose a jar big enough for your starter to double in size. Glass is best, which allows you to see the activity of your starter. Plastic may slowly react to the acidity in the culture so it’s not the healthiest option.

The Temperature

It’s important to follow the instructions and feed your starter with water at about 80º F. Too hot and it could kill the yeast. Also, an ambient temperature of 70-75ºF is ideal for encouraging activity in your culture. If your kitchen is cool, place the starter in the oven with only the oven light on, in a warm corner cupboard, or on a shelf near an electronic device giving off a small amount of heat.

Managing the Bacteria

Sandor Katz, author of Wild Fermentation, and other bread bakers use organic fresh fruit or raisins to encourage the yeasts to develop in their starters. The author of The BreadBaker’s Apprentice, Peter Reinhart, uses unsweetened pineapple juice in place of water, which creates the perfect pH balance for a reliable starter.

Stirring

Reinhart suggests stirring your starter two to three times daily: “For about one minute each time, to aerate it. Yeast loves oxygen and multiplies faster when you stimulate the mixture with air. In addition, the stirring evens out the hydration of the dough and exposes any surface organisms that may have drifted onto the starter to the acidic environment within, and thus deactivates them while the yeast and the good lactobacillus organisms continue to grow. I’ve lost count of how many people solved their starter problem simply by this aeration technique.”

Home bakers and professionals agree, making a sourdough starter is well worth it. There is much to learn and delicious bread to be gained. So take these tips to your kitchen, and get started.

With a little patience, the ancient secret to stellar bread can be yours.

The idea of a sourdough starter—a live culture of wild yeasts that you feed, using it to “start” breads—can seem intimidating. But a sourdough starter requires just flour and water. To make one, all you need is two ingredients, a digital scale, and about five minutes every day for up to a week. The result? You’ll be able to bake better (read: more complex and delicious) fresh-baked breads.

Millennia ago, sourdough is what the first bakers made. If you feel intimidated, remember this: people were making it since long before we knew what yeasts were, since before we had today’s modern advantages of packaged organic flour, digital scales, and tap water.

Yes, it’s a project. Yes, you can do this. It just takes a little time and patience: roughly half an hour of work spread over four to seven days.

Before we delve into process, let’s cover some basics. Bread is fermented, like wine, kombucha, or kefir. Yeast initiates this fermentation. Sourdough is bread that has been fermented using wild yeasts, meaning invisible yeasts naturally occurring in the environment: floating in the air inside and outside, coating surfaces, and even existing naturally in flour. Yeast from the store-bought bag is different. This yeast contains just one strain. When you make sourdough starter, you’re calling on many wild yeasts, meaning many strains.

Using many strains makes for a complex fermentation that can’t be attained with commercial yeasts. In short, employing a sourdough starter makes great bread possible.

Beginning

To begin, you’ll need a scale, mason jar (or another loosely sealable container), water, and unbleached organic white flour. Some starter recipes call for other flours, like whole wheat or rye, but we’re going to keep things simple with white. It is very important, though, to stick to unbleached organic white flour. This ensures that no unwanted chemicals will hamper the gentle development of our starter.

Using your scale, measure 150 grams of flour and 150 grams of warm water. Add them to your jar. Mix with a spoon until you have a uniform beige concoction. Leave the jar uncovered for about an hour, then place a cloth over your jar and loosely cover.

Now, wait until the same time tomorrow.

Middle

Over the first 24 hours, wild yeasts have been working. They are slower to act than commercial yeasts, but they’ve kicked into steady gear. Our next step is to do something we’ll do each day until the starter is ready in close to a week: we feed it, which allows it to grow stronger.

This process begins with a step that might seem counterintuitive. At this point, we must discard well over half of the starter—all but about 80 grams. (To calculate the weight of your starter, subtract the mass of a clean mason jar from the mass of the one holding your starter.)

Next, add 100 grams of water and 100 grams of flour to the starter. Mix well. Leave uncovered for about an hour. Set aside until the same time tomorrow.

On day three, we repeat this process. We also repeat the process on day four. By then, you’ll notice the starter has developed a pungent tang. It will smell like putting your nose directly to a fresh slice of sourdough, only more so.

We continue the daily discarding-and-adding until the starter is ready. There are many variables shaping when that will be, including temperature, environment, and flour type. Allow for some flexibility. If you dutifully feed your nascent starter every day for five to seven days, it should be ready.

How will you know when? It will be gooey, bubbly, quicker to rise up your glass, and develop a pungent smell just a handful of hours after feeding.

Congrats! You now have homemade sourdough starter. You’ll probably notice that you’ve developed something of an understanding of your starter’s behavior: what it needs, and how how it changes over time. Stored in the fridge, your starter will still require the same feeding, only weekly rather than daily. And instead of discarding excess starter, you can now use it as the leavening to begin, or to “start,” a fresh loaf of sourdough bread (or sourdough stuffing).

Simple Techniques, Classic Recipes, Impressive Baked Goods

Our step-by-step guide makes tackling this days-long process way less intimidating.

Photo by: Matt Armendariz

A homemade sourdough starter is a bread baker’s pantry staple — though it does take some tending. Here our method for getting one going from scratch; though it’ll take a few days longer to get to “bread time” than if you’d stolen some starter from a friend, the result will just be that much more satisfying. Once your starter is mature, it will add a tangy flavor and aroma to all your homemade breads.

Photo by: Matt Armendariz

Ingredients:

1 cup (4 ounces) whole-wheat or rye flour

Warm water between 65 to 80 degrees F (see notes below)

Unbleached all-purpose or bread flour, for feeding (see notes below)

Supplies:

One 1-quart glass jar, very clean (see notes below)

Kitchen scale or dry and liquid measuring cups (see notes below)

Notes:

Water: If you know your tap water to be high in chlorine, fill a vessel and let it sit uncovered overnight to release the chlorine before using to mix a starter. Alternately, you may use filtered water. Aim to keep your starter at 75 degrees F. If your environment is much colder, you might want to start with warmer water.

Flour: After the initial mix, you will feed your starter white flour — both all-purpose and bread flour work — just make sure it is unbleached and look for one that has a protein content between 11 to 12 percent for best results.

Jar: To ensure you don’t bring unwanted mold or bacteria into your starter, sterilize your jar by running it though a hot dishwasher wash cycle, or for canning jars, boil for 10 minutes.

Scale: A kitchen scale is optional but if you plan on keeping up your sourdough starter for a long period of time, it will make the feedings a bit easier, less messy and faster.

Day 1: Initial Mix

Add 1 cup (4 ounces) whole-wheat or rye flour into a very clean 1-quart jar along with 1/2 cup (4 ounces) warm tap or filtered water between 65 to 80 degrees F. Stir well until all the flour is moistened and the dough resembles a thick paste. Cover loosely with the lid or plastic wrap. Set out at warm room temperature (75 to 80 degrees F) for 24 hours.

Photo by: Matt Armendariz

Day 2: First Feeding

You will not likely notice much of a difference in appearance in the starter after the first 24 hours other than some condensation and a wheat-like aroma. You will need to begin feeding it to encourage growth. Use a rubber spatula to measure out 2/3 cup (5.5 ounces) of the starter and add it to a stainless steel or glass mixing bowl; discard any remaining starter. Add 1 cup (4 ounces) all-purpose or bread flour along with 1/2 cup (4 ounces) warm tap or filtered water between 65 to 80 degrees F to a stainless steel or glass mixing bowl. Stir well to combine all ingredients, making sure all the flour has been incorporated and the starter is well mixed. Return the starter to the jar. Cover again loosely with the lid or plastic wrap. Set out at warm room temperature (75 to 80 degrees F) for 24 hours.

Photo by: Matt Armendariz

Days 3 to 5: Two Feedings Per Day

On day 3 you should notice some activity in your starter. The mixture should look bubbly and it will probably have risen some. It will have a fresh, slightly tangy aroma. Now you’ll feed the starter twice a day. It’s best to arrange the times to conveniently work with your schedule. Keep them as evenly spaced apart as possible — every 12 hours is the goal. To feed the starter, give it a couple of good stirs to release any bubbles. Measure out a heaping 1/2 cup (4 ounces) starter and place it into a stainless steel or glass mixing bowl; discard any remaining starter. Add 1 cup (4 ounces) all-purpose or bread flour along with 1/2 cup (4 ounces) warm tap or filtered water between 65 to 80 degrees F to a stainless steel or glass mixing bowl. Stir well to combine all the ingredients, making sure all the dry flour has been incorporated and the starter is well mixed. Return the starter to the jar. Cover again loosely with the lid or plastic wrap. Set out at warm room temperature (75 to 80 degrees F). Repeat the process 12 hours later and every 12 hours for the next 2 days.

Whether it conjures up a crusty, flavorful loaf of bread or a bubbling crock of flour/water starter, sourdough is a treasured part of many bakers’ kitchens. But where does the path to sourdough bread begin? Right in your own kitchen, with your own homemade sourdough starter.

Sourdough baking is as much art as science. The method you’ll read here for making sourdough starter isn’t an exact match for the one you read on another site, or in a cookbook, or in your great-grandma’s diary. But it’s the tried-and-true method we use for making starter here at King Arthur, and we feel you’ll have success with it.

Our Sourdough Baking Guide offers all the tips and advice you new (as well as veteran) sourdough bakers need for your guaranteed sourdough success.

Ingredients

To begin your starter

• 1 cup (113g) whole rye (pumpernickel) or whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup (113g) cool water*

To feed your starter

• scant 1 cup (113g) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
• 1/2 cup (113g) cool water (if your house is warm), or lukewarm water (if your house is cool)

Instructions

Day 1: Combine the pumpernickel or whole wheat flour with the cool water in a non-reactive container. Glass, crockery, stainless steel, or food-grade plastic all work fine for this. Make sure the container is large enough to hold your starter as it grows; we recommend at least 1-quart capacity.

Stir everything together thoroughly; make sure there’s no dry flour anywhere. Cover the container loosely and let the mixture sit at warm room temperature (about 70°F) for 24 hours. See “tips,” below, for advice about growing starters in a cold house.

Day 2: You may see no activity at all in the first 24 hours, or you may see a bit of growth or bubbling. Either way, discard half the starter (113 grams, about 1/2 cup), and add to the remainder a scant 1 cup (113 grams) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, and 1/2 cup (113 grams) cool water (if your house is warm); or lukewarm water (if it’s cold).

Mix well, cover, and let the mixture rest at room temperature for 24 hours.

Perfect your technique

How to make your own sourdough starter

Day 3: By the third day, you’ll likely see some activity — bubbling; a fresh, fruity aroma, and some evidence of expansion. It’s now time to begin two feedings daily, as evenly spaced as your schedule allows. For each feeding, weigh out 113 grams starter; this will be a generous 1/2 cup, once it’s thoroughly stirred down. Discard any remaining starter.

Add a scant 1 cup (113 grams) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, and 1/2 cup (113 grams) water to the 113 grams starter. Mix the starter, flour, and water, cover, and let the mixture rest at room temperature for approximately 12 hours before repeating.

Day 4: Weigh out 113 grams starter, and discard any remaining starter. Repeat step #6.

Day 5: Weigh out 113 grams starter, and discard any remaining starter. Repeat step #6. By the end of day #5, the starter should have at least doubled in volume. You’ll see lots of bubbles; there may be some little “rivulets” on the surface, full of finer bubbles. Also, the starter should have a tangy aroma — pleasingly acidic, but not overpowering. If your starter hasn’t risen much and isn’t showing lots of bubbles, repeat discarding and feeding every 12 hours on day 6, and day 7, if necessary — as long as it takes to create a vigorous (risen, bubbly) starter. Note: see “tips,” below.

Once the starter is ready, give it one last feeding. Discard all but 113 grams (a generous 1/2 cup). Feed as usual. Let the starter rest at room temperature for 6 to 8 hours; it should be active, with bubbles breaking the surface. Hate discarding so much starter? See “tips,” below.

Remove however much starter you need for your recipe — typically no more than 227 grams, about 1 cup. If your recipe calls for more than 1 cup of starter, give it a couple of feedings without discarding, until you’ve made enough for your recipe plus 113 grams to keep and feed again.

Transfer the remaining 113 grams of starter to its permanent home: a crock, jar, or whatever you’d like to store it in long-term. Feed this reserved starter with 1 scant cup (113 grams) of flour and 1/2 cup (113 grams) water, and let it rest at room temperature for several hours, to get going, before covering it. If you’re storing starter in a screw-top jar, screw the top on loosely rather than airtight.

Store this starter in the refrigerator, and feed it regularly; we recommend feeding it with a scant 1 cup (113 grams) flour and 1/2 cup (113 grams) water once a week.

Tips from our Bakers

Why do you need to discard half the starter? It seems so wasteful. But unless you discard starter at some point, eventually you’ll end up with a very large container of starter. Also, keeping the volume down offers the yeast more food to eat each time you feed it; it’s not fighting with quite so many other little yeast cells to get enough to eat. You don’t have to actually discard it if you don’t want to, either; you can give it to a friend, or use it to bake. There are quite a few recipes on our site using “discard” starter, including pizza crust, pretzels, and waffles, and even chocolate cake. If you’re still uncomfortable dealing with discard, though, try maintaining a smaller starter: the smaller the starter, the smaller the amount of discard.

Why does this starter begin with whole-grain flour? Because the wild yeast that gives sourdough starter its life is more likely to be found in the flora- and fauna-rich environment of a whole-grain flour than in all-purpose flour. What if all you have is all-purpose flour, no whole wheat? Go ahead and use all-purpose; you may find the starter simply takes a little longer to get going. Also, if you feed your starter on a long-term basis with anything other than the all-purpose flour called for here, it will probably look different (thicker or thinner, a different color) and act differently as well. Not to say you can’t feed your starter with alternate flours; just that the results may not be what you expect.

Bake it better! Watch King Arthur baker/blogger Kye Ameden demonstrate one of the techniques from this recipe: Maintaining Sourdough Starter Without the Mess

no cooking required

Natural yoghurt gives this sourdough starter recipe a helping hand by introducing a little friendly bacteria.

To learn how to use this starter see our easy recipe for sourdough bread.

no cooking required

Ingredients

Day 1

• 175ml/6fl oz skimmed milk
• 75ml/5 tbsp fresh, live, full-fat, plain yoghurt

Day 2

• 120g/4oz strong white flour

Day 4

• 180g/6oz strong white flour
• 100ml/3½fl oz water
• 40ml/3 tbsp milk

Day 5

• 150g/5½oz strong white flour
• 150ml/5½fl oz water

Method

On day one, heat the milk in a saucepan over a gentle heat. Place the yoghurt into a bowl and stir in the warmed milk. Cover and leave in a warm place for 12-24 hours until thickened. Stir in any liquids that may have separated.

On day two, stir the strong white flour into the yoghurt, incorporating evenly. Cover and leave at room temperature (about 20C) for two days. The mixture should be full of bubbles and smell pleasantly sour.

On day four, add the measured flour to the starter with the water and the milk. Cover and leave at warm room temperature for 12-24 hours.

On day five the starter should be quite active now and be full of little bubbles. Remove half of the starter and discard. Add the flour and the water to the remaining starter and mix thoroughly. Cover and leave at warm room temperature for 24 hours.

On day six the starter should be ready to use. You can keep the starter at room temperature, but you will need to feed it daily. Combine equal parts of the starter, water and flour and mix thoroughly. You may have to discard some of the starter so that you do not end up with too much. Keep covered and use as needed.

If baking less often, keep the starter covered in the fridge, feeding it once every five days or so by mixing equal parts of starter, flour and water.

Recipe Tips

You can freeze some of your sourdough starter if needed, as a back-up in case you need to start again. You can also keep it in the fridge if you bake less often.

Some compare it to a lover. Others compare it to a baby. It’s great training for learning how to maintain all types of intimate relationships. We’re talking about none other than. a sourdough starter. Every day at the same time you’ll feed it food and water and lovingly watch it come alive, observing its every rise and fall. Together, you and your starter can make anything, from pancakes to bread.

A sourdough starter is a collection of wild yeasts naturally found everywhere, from the air in your home to the flour you’re using. Whole-grain flours contain more of the wheat kernel, so they tend to be richer in wild yeasts than more processed white flours. Organic would be even better. I recommend beginning a starter with a flour blend that contains some whole-grain flour (such as whole wheat or rye flour) in order to help jump-start the process. You can absolutely use 100% all-purpose flour: the mixture will seem looser but will function just as well as a leavener. If using 100% whole-grain, the texture of the starter will be thicker and less runny.

To keep a starter as consistent and predictable as possible, use the same flour ratios—but baking sourdough is all about experimentation, so the sky is the limit on what you use.

Be sure to give your starter a nice environment to live in. Begin with a clean container so that you avoid breeding harmful bacteria. A clear glass jar is best because you can visibly track your starter’s progress from all sides. If your tap water is too chemically treated, filtered water would be a better choice to avoid harming the yeast culture.

The ambient temperature will determine how fast the starter develops. Do your best to place it somewhere out of direct sunlight and somewhere that’s between 75° to 80°. During colder days, fermentation will happen more slowly. On hot days, you may have to feed it twice and use colder water to avoid over-fermentation.

The amount of starter yielded from this recipe is perfect for using in our sourdough bread recipe, but if you won’t be baking every day, there’s a variety of ways to reserve flour supply and limit the amount of discard you’re producing. You can reduce the amount of flour and water you use during each feeding, so long as you keep the 1:2:2 ratio of starter:water:flour.

Once your starter is active and predictable in its rise and fall, you can also put it on hold by placing it in the fridge and feeding it once a week or even less frequently. (Fun fact: I once resurrected a starter that hadn’t been fed for 6 months.) The colder temperature will slow down the fermentation activity drastically, so you won’t see much change happening in the fridge. 2 to 4 hours before each feeding, pull it out of the fridge to let it warm up to room temperature. You can put it back in the fridge immediately after a feeding.

For even longer storage, you can spread your starter in a thin layer across a baking sheet lined with parchment or a Silpat and let it dehydrate completely in an off oven. Once completely dry, crumble into shards and store in an airtight container, out of direct sunlight in a cool place. This is essentially homemade yeast. To revive, mix with water and let sit for 6 to 12 hours until completely softened, then continue with a feeding. While some bakers like to freeze their starters, we don’t recommend this method because there is a risk of killing your yeast culture with the crystallization that happens when water turns into ice.

For both of these holding methods, remember that you must feed your starter on a regular schedule to fully revive it back to normal activity. Once active, always make sure it passes the float test (see recipe below) before using in a sourdough bread recipe!

If you’ve made this recipe, let us know what you think by leaving us a comment and a rating down below. For more bread ideas, check out these 20+ recipes for bread enthusiasts.

Sourdough is a mixture of flour, water and salt. It’s one of the simplest and oldest forms of leavened bread in the world, predating Ancient Egypt. It has grown to become one of the most popular types of bread and has the added bonus of not using conventional yeast, so long as you have a sourdough starter, or ‘mother’.

Here’s our simple guide to starting and maintaining a sourdough starter, with tips and tricks for mastering the first stage of sourdough bread.

DAY 1

Mix 100g strong white bread flour and 100g dark rye flour together in a bowl. Add 200ml warm water and mix well with your hands until combined, and there are no dry clumps of flour. Using a rubber spatula, transfer the mixture into a clean, clear container with enough room for the mixture to double in size.

Make a note of the level of the mixture (you could slip a rubber band over the jar to mark the current height of the dough.). Check the smell, too. It should be light and floury with an almost milky sweetness. Cover loosely with a lid, or a piece of muslin, and store in a warm, draught-free place for 24 hours.

DAY 2

Remove the lid of your container and look for signs of fermentation. There may be one or two bubbles on the surface or down the side of the container. The dough should have lost some of its milky smell and it should start to smell a little acidic. Cover again and return to a warm place for another 24 hours.

DAY 3

Remove the lid of the container and check again for signs of fermentation. The surface of your mixture should have plenty of bubbles. It may have increased in volume and should now have an acidic, almost rancid smell. This is a sign that your starter has fermented and is ready for a feed.

FEEDING THE STARTER

This process of discarding some of the mother and incorporating new flour and water is called ‘feeding’ the starter.

Discard all but 50g of your sourdough starter (this discarded starter can be kept in the fridge and added to pancake batters or used to make crumpets). Add the remaining sourdough starter to a bowl with 100ml warm water and 100g strong white bread flour . Mix with your hands until completely combined and then return to your original container, adjusting your marker to reflect the new level of the mixture. Cover and return to a warm place for another 24 hours.

DAY 4

The following day, your starter should continue to show signs of fermentation, perhaps doubling in size within the container and producing a similar acidic smell. There should be plenty of bubbles on the surface, too. Repeat the same feeding process of discarding all but 50g of your starter and replacing with new flour and water. Cover and return to a warm place for another 24 hours. Continue this feeding process every 24 hours for another 3 days. If your starter is not showing signs of fermentation, simply leave it to stand in a warm place until it does. Do not continue to feed it anyway.

On the fifth day of feeding, once your starter is consistently showing signs of fermentation 24 hours after being fed, it is ready to use. Follow our sourdough recipe to make the perfect sourdough loaf.

Continue to feed your starter in between bakes and only store in the fridge if you’re not baking a loaf within about 2 weeks. You can ‘wake’ your starter when it comes out of the fridge by feeding it for 3 consecutive days before you want to mix your dough, continually watching for signs of fermentation as you do.

I didn’t make a sourdough starter for sourdough bread for a long time because it was intimidating. There were so many people out there giving so many tips – bloggers, YouTubers, Instagramers – everyone made it look like a complicated process, overly involved process and it scared me.

I bake and I love to bake, but cooking is more of my thing. Baking always seems so precise and sourdough bread with its sourdough starter seemed to be the most finicky kind of bread. I like to taste as I go normally and that doesn’t work so well with dough.

But, I finally took the plunge and guess what? You don’t need a book to tell you how to make a sourdough starter. You don’t need to watch hours of Youtube. Here are some simple lessons I learned in starting my sourdough starter that will help kick off your journey of made-from-scratch baking.

What is Sourdough Starter

Sourdough starter is a mixture of water and flour that you use to make sourdough bread and other sourdough bread-like products. Instead of using a packet of yeast from the store, sourdough is made via a fermentation process and uses a naturally occurring lactobacilli (lactic acid) and yeast that’s living in your environment.

Here’s how you make it

Day 1: To start your sourdough starter you need a cup of water and a cup of flour. You want to mix it together in a glass bowl and leave it on your kitchen counter. Ideally, leave it closer to the oven so when the oven is on it’s a bit warmer. The heat will help to make the natural yeast more active. Cover with a clean kitchen towel, cheese cloth or put a lid on loosely. You want the starter to have access to air. It’s alive, after all.

Day 2: Remove half of the starter and discard it. Add another cup of water, flour, mix and cover lightly. This is how you feed your sourdough starter. Ideally, you want to do this at the same time each day.

Day 3: Remove half and discard it. Add another cup of flour and water each. Mix and then lightly cover. You’re probably already starting to see bubbles in your starter! This is good. This means it is active.

Hooch

You may also see a watery liquid called Hooch. Technically, it’s alcohol but it’s naturally produced by the yeast. It also means the sourdough starter is hungry and you may want to feed it earlier or feed it multiple times a day (which I don’t recommend doing until Day 7 because you’ll fly through the flour).

You can just skim it off the top and continue to feed as normal. I found that moving my feeding time up helped to reduce the amount of hooch. You really want to make sure you are feeding at least once every 24 hours to avoid it. I recommend feeding at the same time of day, every day.

Day 4: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour.

Day 5: Today is the day you can start using your sourdough starter discard. I like to make crackers with mine. My cracker recipe requires 1.5 cups of sourdough starter. So, when I want to make crackers, I remove 1.5 cups of sourdough starter and then add 1.5 cups of flour and water each. If you don’t want to make anything, just keep removing a cup of the starter and then adding a cup of flour and water each.

Day 6: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 7: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover. This is the first day you can attempt to make sourdough bread if you want to. However, I recommend waiting until at least Day 10.

Day 8: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 9: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 10: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover. You could try to make sourdough bread this day. That said, I waited until Day 13. Here is the recipe and process I used to make our’s.

After Day 10

After Day 10 if you want to slow your starter down, stick it in the refrigerator. The coolness delays the active process within the starter and it won’t grow as quickly. Then, you only have to feed it once a week too.

I recommend this for anyone who is not a baker. Unless you use it every single day, you’re going to go through A LOT of flour and it will start to feel really wasteful to just throw away the starter discard.

Using the sourdough starter once it’s on ice

When you want to use it, take it out of the refrigerator, remove the starter amount you need for your recipe, feed it that same amount in cups of water and flour and then stick it back in the refrigerator. That’s it.

The type of flour

You can really use any kind of flour. Most purists will tell you to use whole wheat, unbleached flour. I use bread flour. It’s what I had available the day I wanted to begin my sourdough starter and since we are under a stay at home order here in Michigan flour has become a scare commodity.

However, after watching Patrick Ryan on YouTube ( a beautifully, short video on how to make sourdough) it gave me confidence to try with another type of flour. Based on the way my bread has turned out, I can say he was right.

So that’s it, friends. Does it still seem as intimidating as it did when you first started reading this? I hope not!

Storing sourdough starter

Here’s a few great containers for storing your sourdough starter:

• Square Clear Jar with chalkboard
• 50.75 oz Clear Jar
• Anchor Hocking Jar – I use this one now to store my starter.

For more recipes from scratch, click here. To see the sourdough bread recipe and process I used, click here. Lastly, you can find my delicious Butter Parmesan Sourdough Crackers made from sourdough discard here.

Thank you so much for visiting today! I hope you’ll come back soon to see what else we are up to at Sugar Maple Farmhouse.

I didn’t make a sourdough starter for sourdough bread for a long time because it was intimidating. There were so many people out there giving so many tips – bloggers, YouTubers, Instagramers – everyone made it look like a complicated process, overly involved process and it scared me.

I bake and I love to bake, but cooking is more of my thing. Baking always seems so precise and sourdough bread with its sourdough starter seemed to be the most finicky kind of bread. I like to taste as I go normally and that doesn’t work so well with dough.

But, I finally took the plunge and guess what? You don’t need a book to tell you how to make a sourdough starter. You don’t need to watch hours of Youtube. Here are some simple lessons I learned in starting my sourdough starter that will help kick off your journey of made-from-scratch baking.

What is Sourdough Starter

Sourdough starter is a mixture of water and flour that you use to make sourdough bread and other sourdough bread-like products. Instead of using a packet of yeast from the store, sourdough is made via a fermentation process and uses a naturally occurring lactobacilli (lactic acid) and yeast that’s living in your environment.

Here’s how you make it

Day 1: To start your sourdough starter you need a cup of water and a cup of flour. You want to mix it together in a glass bowl and leave it on your kitchen counter. Ideally, leave it closer to the oven so when the oven is on it’s a bit warmer. The heat will help to make the natural yeast more active. Cover with a clean kitchen towel, cheese cloth or put a lid on loosely. You want the starter to have access to air. It’s alive, after all.

Day 2: Remove half of the starter and discard it. Add another cup of water, flour, mix and cover lightly. This is how you feed your sourdough starter. Ideally, you want to do this at the same time each day.

Day 3: Remove half and discard it. Add another cup of flour and water each. Mix and then lightly cover. You’re probably already starting to see bubbles in your starter! This is good. This means it is active.

Hooch

You may also see a watery liquid called Hooch. Technically, it’s alcohol but it’s naturally produced by the yeast. It also means the sourdough starter is hungry and you may want to feed it earlier or feed it multiple times a day (which I don’t recommend doing until Day 7 because you’ll fly through the flour).

You can just skim it off the top and continue to feed as normal. I found that moving my feeding time up helped to reduce the amount of hooch. You really want to make sure you are feeding at least once every 24 hours to avoid it. I recommend feeding at the same time of day, every day.

Day 4: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour.

Day 5: Today is the day you can start using your sourdough starter discard. I like to make crackers with mine. My cracker recipe requires 1.5 cups of sourdough starter. So, when I want to make crackers, I remove 1.5 cups of sourdough starter and then add 1.5 cups of flour and water each. If you don’t want to make anything, just keep removing a cup of the starter and then adding a cup of flour and water each.

Day 6: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 7: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover. This is the first day you can attempt to make sourdough bread if you want to. However, I recommend waiting until at least Day 10.

Day 8: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 9: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover.

Day 10: Remove 1 cup of the Sourdough starter. Add 1 cup of water and 1 cup of flour. Mix and cover. You could try to make sourdough bread this day. That said, I waited until Day 13. Here is the recipe and process I used to make our’s.

After Day 10

After Day 10 if you want to slow your starter down, stick it in the refrigerator. The coolness delays the active process within the starter and it won’t grow as quickly. Then, you only have to feed it once a week too.

I recommend this for anyone who is not a baker. Unless you use it every single day, you’re going to go through A LOT of flour and it will start to feel really wasteful to just throw away the starter discard.

Using the sourdough starter once it’s on ice

When you want to use it, take it out of the refrigerator, remove the starter amount you need for your recipe, feed it that same amount in cups of water and flour and then stick it back in the refrigerator. That’s it.

The type of flour

You can really use any kind of flour. Most purists will tell you to use whole wheat, unbleached flour. I use bread flour. It’s what I had available the day I wanted to begin my sourdough starter and since we are under a stay at home order here in Michigan flour has become a scare commodity.

However, after watching Patrick Ryan on YouTube ( a beautifully, short video on how to make sourdough) it gave me confidence to try with another type of flour. Based on the way my bread has turned out, I can say he was right.

So that’s it, friends. Does it still seem as intimidating as it did when you first started reading this? I hope not!

Storing sourdough starter

Here’s a few great containers for storing your sourdough starter:

• Square Clear Jar with chalkboard
• 50.75 oz Clear Jar
• Anchor Hocking Jar – I use this one now to store my starter.

For more recipes from scratch, click here. To see the sourdough bread recipe and process I used, click here. Lastly, you can find my delicious Butter Parmesan Sourdough Crackers made from sourdough discard here.

Thank you so much for visiting today! I hope you’ll come back soon to see what else we are up to at Sugar Maple Farmhouse.

The Spruce / Julia Hartbeck

• Total: 5 mins
• Prep: 5 mins
• Cook: 0 mins
• Servings: 15 servings
• Yield: 1 starter

×

Homemade sourdough bread begins with a sourdough starter. Bakers are known to covet a healthy starter and care for it like a treasured family heirloom. If you haven’t made a sourdough starter before, this easy recipe is a good place to begin.

A starter is a homemade fermented yeast for bread. With regular yeast bread, you can use a store-bought packet of active dry yeast. Sourdough breads, on the other hand, get their flavor from wild yeast that is naturally found in your kitchen. Capturing a good yeast from the environment alone can sometimes be tricky, so this recipe gets help from a bit of store-bought yeast to kick-start the process.

Once the starter has had a chance to bubble up and grow more yeast, you can use it in sourdough bread recipes. A sourdough starter can be kept alive for months or even years with proper care. Remember, yeast is a living organism, and this starter certainly has a life of its own.

Ingredients

• 2 cups warm water
• 2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast (or 1 [7-gram] package)
• 2 cups all-purpose flour

Steps to Make It

Gather the ingredients.

In a ceramic bowl, add the warm water and yeast. Mix with a wooden spoon until the yeast is dissolved.

Stir in the flour and mix until smooth.

Pour the starter into a plastic container that is at least four times larger than the liquid starter (such as a 1/2-gallon ice cream container or Mason jar). This will allow room for the starter to expand.

Cover the container with a cloth napkin and hold in place with a rubber band.

Set the starter in a warm spot for 5 days, stirring once a day.

Refrigerate (or freeze) and use it as needed.

Keep Your Sourdough Starter Alive

You can choose to store your sourdough starter on the counter or in the refrigerator. Many bakers choose to refrigerate their starter because it slows down the culture’s growth. It also means that you only need to feed it once a week. However, if you don’t have room in the fridge for your culture, you can store it at room temperature. Keep it away from extreme heat and humidity, and make sure you feed it once a day.

When feeding your sourdough starter, remove 1 cup of starter into a new bowl (this is the starter you’re going to replenish). You can use the remaining starter for a bread recipe, discard it, or make another delicious sourdough baked good. Half of the starter is discarded to keep the yeast growth under control and manageable and the remaining starter healthy. Then feed the starter in the clean bowl with the 1 cup (110 grams) of flour and 1/2 cup (110 grams) of water. Allow it to rest at room temperature for 1 hour before returning to the refrigerator.

Disclosure: Some of the links in this post may be affiliate links and if you go via these links to make a purchase, I will earn a commission. I have linked these products because I have tried and would thoroughly recommend them, not because of any commission I may receive. Whether you act on this recommendation or not is completely up to you. Check out my Disclaimer for more information.

Making sourdough bread at home is becoming an increasingly popular trend. When I told my friends, I had made my own sourdough starter, one turned to me and said she had also just made one, and another immediately asked if she could have some of it. So even among students, there are some keen beans that want to give homemade sourdough bread a try!

I absolutely love the smell of freshly baked bread – and you simply cannot beat a fresh sourdough!

To make a sourdough loaf, you need to use a “starter”. In this baking basics post, I will explain to you what a sourdough starter is, how to make it, how to use it and how to keep it going (perhaps forever and ever!)

What is a sourdough starter?

Usually, when bread baking, you use dried or fresh yeast. However, you can also use naturally occurring wild yeast (a fungus that is contained in the air around you, as well as in flour), as a natural leavening agent for making bread.
If you leave a mixture of water and flour at room temperature, the wild yeast will naturally get trapped in it. It then “feeds” off the sugars in the flour and water and starts to multiply. This process is known as fermentation and people have been using this to make bread rise for thousands of years.

A sourdough starter is technically a living thing, so in order to survive and continue to expand it requires attention and feeding. It´s a bit like a pet if you want to think of it that way – just a lot less work. If kept in the fridge, you only need to feed the starter about once per week.

A jar of sourdough starter also makes a great gift for other bread-baking-enthusiasts! I gave some of this starter to my dad for Christmas. I attached the feeding instructions and a basic recipe to the jar and tied some ribbon around it to make a cute present! He loved it and I have shown him how to use it and some of my recipes.

How do you make a sourdough starter?

All you need to make a sourdough starter are a few simple, household ingredients. You can just use water and flour to make a starter, but I also used a little milk and yoghurt at the start to introduce a few more bacteria and help the fermentation process along a little (the exact recipe can be found below).

You will also need a large jar (about 1.5 litres capacity) with a rubber ring around the lid, so that it can be sealed tightly. This is the one I used for my Dad´s Christmas Present.

When first making the sourdough starter, it requires daily attention, but only for a few minutes each day. But once it is done, you can keep it going forever and never have to make another one! All you need to do is feed it!

Your sourdough starter is ready to use after about a week. It should look very active and bubbly. If not, give it another day or two before you use it.

Feeding Instructions – How to Keep your Sourdough Starter Alive

To maintain your sourdough starter, you must “feed” it. This just means that you need to give it a little flour and water every now and again as food so that it can continue growing.

If you bake daily, keep your starter at room temperature and feed daily. If like me, you are very much a home baker and only want to make bread about once a week, keep the sourdough starter in the fridge. This will retard its growth meaning you only need to feed in once per week, just before baking.

Feeding your starter is very easy!

First, if it has been in the fridge, take it out and leave it for a few hours to come to room temperature.

Your sourdough mix will grow exponentially if you never use or remove any starter. Therefore, most recipes usually tell you to discard about half of the starter, before feeding it. I, however, have found that for me, it is easiest to weigh out the exact amount of starter I wish to retain and then discard enough to maintain that weight (this then might be more or less than half of the starter). Keeping back and feeding 200g of starter has proven the perfect amount for my recipes and needs. If you need more starter, you can just keep more. It´s a very flexible process. Read my recipe instructions below for more information.

Once the starter has reached room temperature, all you need to do is feed it with the same amounts of flour and water as the remaining starter. For example, if you have 200g of starter, you add 200g flour and 200g of water to the jar. Then mix thoroughly.

If not using, return the jar to the fridge. If you are wanting to use the starter, leave it at room temperature for about four hours until it has grown and has bubbled up. Remove the amount of starter you need for the recipe, then return the remaining sourdough starter to the fridge.

It is important you always keep back some of your starter so that you never run out!

How do I know when to feed my starter?

As mentioned above, if keeping at room temperature, the starter needs to be fed every single day. In the fridge, once a week, for me, is sufficient. Depending on your starter and fridge temperature this may differ slightly. So other indications that your starter may need fed, is if you start to see a brownish liquid forming on top of the starter. This is known as hooch (a naturally-occuring alcohol produced by the fermentation process). It´s nothing bad, it just means the starter is hungry and needs feeding. Simply make sure you discard that liquid and then feed it following the instructions below.

Adding a Twist… Rye Sourdough Starter

Once your white flour sourdough starter is well established, why not try adding a little twist? Remove some of the sourdough starter, put it into another jar and start feeding it with rye flour to make a rye sourdough starter! And then you can use it to make this delicious Rye Sourdough Bread.

Sourdough Bread Recipes

If you are looking for some sourdough bread recipes that you could make with your newly-established starter, why not check out some of these:

I don’t know too many people who aren’t lovers of sourdough bread – everyone pretty much loves to love it and it’s amazing when you smear it with butter fresh from the oven.

Sourdough is one of the easiest breads to make – you simply make your sourdough starter from scratch, wait a few days, and then take a few more simple steps, wait for the rise, and then bake. It might sound somewhat complicated but it really isn’t at all.

If you are on a gluten-free restriction, you’ll be happy to know that you can make your own gluten-free sourdough bread, too!

Unlike traditional bread, that can be made with just a few hours notice, sourdough requires a few days of advance planning – and I say days because you need a really good, active starter, and that in itself takes 3-4 days to prepare. Once you have that active starter, then you need time to mix the dough, shape the dough, let it rise, and then allow it to bake.

One other thing: traditional bread is somewhat foolproof — provided you have fresh yeast that isn’t expired, it will almost always turn out amazing. Sourdough, on the other hand, may not always go too well on your first try… or, sometimes even your second. I blew through what seemed like dozens and dozens of bags of flour making sourdough bread, in every attempt to make it right. It wasn’t until a year or so ago that I actually succeeded.

Please, stick with it, no matter how discouraged you get. It does get easier. I promise!

Prepare Beforehand

Thinking back to my first loaf of sourdough, it was dense, hard and very dry. I tried making that same recipe over, and over and over again – over time, it improved, but nowhere near what I can do today. We tried to use the dense loaves, even though they were very very hard but I wanted nothing more than to be successful at this bread making thing.. so I continued to work at it.

Now that I have made every attempt to perfect my sourdough, I’m sharing some things that you might want to keep in mind through the process:

Making the Starter

When you bake sourdough, you need to use a starter that is at its peak — if you don’t currently have a starter at home, you can make your own starter, and feed it once or twice a day. I usually feed mine twice each day (morning, and night). Cover in between feedings with a napkin, handkerchief or cheesecloth to avoid debris from getting inside.

1. All you need is three ingredients to make a sourdough starter: flour, yeast and water.
2. Only use glass or ceramic bowls along with wooden spoons when making sourdough. Avoid using metal or stainless steel – sourdough is made “sour” by acids, and acids will react to metals. I love using a tall glass jar that allows room for the starter to grow and expand.
3. Use warm water, avoid hot water. Aim for a water temp of 90-100 degrees.
4. Once your starter is mixed, loosely cover & allow to sit on your counter top; The sourdough will start to bubble and over the next 24-48 hours, it will expand. After 48 hours, feed that starter 1 C. flour, 2/3 C. water and 1 tsp of sugar. Mix well, and re-cover. You should see the starter expand over the next few hours, then go back down and get bubbly again on the top.
5. After 48-72 hours, the starter is ready to use. I find that the starter is “best” used about 4 hours after a recent feeding.
6. If you don’t plan on using the starter at that time, place in the refrigerator and feed once per week (1 C. flour, 2/3 C. water and 1 tsp sugar). Once you plan on using it, remove from the fridge and allow to come to room temp. Feed that starter (above ratio), then allow to sit for 4-5 hours before using.

Envious of everyone’s fresh sourdough bread that they’re posting on Instagram? Here’s the recipe to get your own starter going.

There are many advantages to baking your own bread. The yeasty smell of a loaf baking in the oven alone can make you happy. The process of slowly kneading and shaping dough also connects you to your food and can often be a meditative and much needed time away from your phone screen. Then there’s the obvious: Fresh, hot bread is delicious and beats a bag of the sliced stuff any day. While many types of bread only require flour, salt, and yeast, you’ll need a sourdough starter instead of yeast to make those crusty sourdough loaves that are appearing on nearly everyone’s Instagram feeds these days.

What is a sourdough starter?

A sourdough starter is a mixture of flour and water used to make sourdough bread that has been left at room temperature to ferment over the course of about a week. Throughout that period, the starter harvests yeast from the air around it. As you feed it with new flour and water each day, the yeast will start to multiply and create good types of bacteria and bubbles. Those bubbles are what will eventually be used to leaven—or give rise—your bread naturally without the help of commercially produced yeast. This fermented mixture is also what gives sourdough bread its signature tang. After the initial period to create the starter, it can be stored in your refrigerator and fed with more flour and water on a weekly basis indefinitely to keep the yeast and bacteria you created fresh.

How to make a sourdough starter:

Ingredients to begin

• 1 cup (113 grams) whole wheat or rye flour
• 1/2 cup (113 grams) water (some will suggest bottled mineral water is best, but tap water also works just fine)

Ingredients to feed your starter

• 1 cup (113 grams) all purpose flour
• ½ cup cup (113 grams) water

Tools

• A digital kitchen scale or measuring cups
• A non-reactive container (glass, stainless steel, or ceramic all work) that can hold at least 1 quart, since your starter will need room to grow in it

Day 1

Combine 1 cup (113 grams) of whole wheat or rye flour with ½ cup (113 grams) of water thoroughly in the non-reactive container. Leave the container out at room temperature (at least 70 degrees), uncovered, for 24 hours. It is important to let air circulate around the starter so it can capture natural yeasts in the air, but if you don’t want to leave it entirely uncovered, you can secure a layer of cheesecloth over the container with a rubber band.

Days 2 and 3

Discard half the starter (about 113 grams or ½ cup of the mixture). You’ll be discarding quite a bit of starter over the next few days, which you can either reuse to make pancakes or compost. To the remaining starter, add 1 cup (113 grams) all purpose flour and ½ cup (113 grams) water. Combine and let sit at room temperature for 24 hours.

Day 4

You should notice some bubbles and will want to start feeding your starter every 12 hours now. Continue feeding by weighing out 113 grams starter, discarding the remainder, and feeding with 113 grams all purpose flour and 113 grams water. Mix, cover, and let rest for 12 hours before repeating again.

Day 5

Repeat the same 1:1:1 ratio of starter, flour, and water feeding every 12 hours. By the end of Day 5, you may have an active sourdough starter. A sourdough starter is ready to use when you see lots of bubbles on the surface and the mixture has doubled in volume. An active sourdough starter will also smell a little bit fruity or tangy.

If your starter hasn’t doubled in volume and is not bubbly, repeat the process of discarding and feeding every 12 hours until it does. The process often takes up to a week so continue feeding for a few extra days if it hasn’t doubled yet—patience is key here.

How to store sourdough starter:

Once you have an active sourdough starter that has doubled in volume, you can begin to store it in your refrigerator covered and reduce the feedings to about once a week.

Feeding your sourdough starter:

To maintain your sourdough starter, you should feed it at least once a week (even if you’re not using it to bake).

Before you bake with it, you must revive your starter first by feeding it (sourdough starter can’t be used straight from the fridge). The night before you plan on baking, remove the starter from the fridge and feed it with fresh flour and water, leaving it out covered at room temperature.

Either way, the feeding process is the same: weigh out 113 grams or ½ cup of starter and discard the rest. To the remaining mixture, add 1 cup (113 grams) all purpose flour and ½ cup (113 grams water). Mix and let rest covered until the mixture has doubled. Depending on the warmth of your house and how active your starter is, this could take as little as an hour or two, or up to 12 hours. If your house is a little chilly, you can speed up the process by keeping your starter in the oven with the light on. Be sure to leave a note to let people know not to turn the oven on and ruin your starter by baking it.

How to tell if your starter has gone bad:

If you’ve stored your starter in the fridge for a while, you may notice a clear liquid floating on the top of it. This is hooch, a naturally occurring alcohol that is harmless. Just be sure to pour it off before using your starter.

However, if your starter is growing mold, or has orange or pink streaks on the surface, it has gone bad and should be discarded. If your starter also smells bad—instead of the naturally tangy or fruity scent it had before—it’s also best to throw it out and start again.

What to make with your sourdough starter once it’s ready:

The obvious choice is a loaf of sourdough bread, but you can also find recipes online for everything from sourdough pancakes, to sourdough focaccia, to sourdough pretzels, to sourdough crackers. The best part about these other recipes is that they often make use of the discarded sourdough starter you’re left with when you feed it. King Arthur Flour is a great resource for recipes that use sourdough starter discard.

Where to buy sourdough starter:

If you’re overwhelmed or don’t have a week to go through the whole discard and feed process to get a sourdough starter going, you can also buy one online (we won’t tell!). King Arthur Flour sells its sourdough starter through its website and you can also find tons of options on Etsy. Some bakeries like Mr. Holmes Bakehouse in San Francisco have also started selling their own sourdough starters online to help home bakers do their own thing during the coronavirus lockdown.

Many bakers have treasured sourdough starters that have been passed down for generations. For homesteaders who haven’t inherited a magical bread-making formula, you can make sourdough starter by following a few simple steps.

©Zagorulko Inna/Adobe Stock

At the most basic level, sourdough starters (which is somewhat of a misnomer, as starter can be used for a variety of breads and baked goods) host the microorganisms that make complex, chewy, crusty and flavorful bread. But bread-making is as much an art as it is a science; there are many different recipes and techniques for making sourdough starter.

“There are probably as many different recipes for sourdough starter as there are bakers in the country,” says Dan Tabor, chef-instructor and assistant department chair of baking and pastry arts at the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier, Vermont. “It depends on how quickly you want it to mature and what you want the final texture to be like.”

Peter Reinhart, chef on assignment at Johnson & Wales University in Charlotte, North Carolina, and author of the book “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread,” says that some starter recipes call for add-ins like yogurt, potato skins, chopped onions, or raisins to catalyze the production of good bacteria. No matter the added accoutrements, the basic ingredients you will need are flour and water.

“When a bakery becomes successful for their bread, everyone wants to know their secret formula,” Reinhart says. “They’re all legitimate, valid methods in the end.”

Some bakeries like to keep two or three types of starters made with different kinds of flour — starter made with rye flour, for example, will have a different flavor profile with more sweetness — but in general, whole grain flour will yield the best results because of its wild yeast content. Reinhart says all-purpose flour will work in a pinch if you tend to the starter properly (for his classes, Reinhart will sometimes create starter with all-purpose white flour, just to show that it can be done).

The first step to starting your sourdough starter is to combine the flour and water (if it is drinkable, tap water will work for your starter as long as it is not so heavily treated that you can smell it) in a non-reactive container that does not contain metals like copper and aluminum, which react with certain kinds of food and often leave a metallic taste. Glass, crockery or food-grade plastic all work well. Some bakers have an aversion to using stainless steel bowls, but they are also non-reactive. Make sure the container is large enough to hold the starter as it grows as well; 1 quart is usually sufficient. A breathable lid is useful, but a clean towel, plastic wrap, or coffee filter will work.

The exact ratio of flour to water will depend on the consistency you want for your starter. Reinhart recommends 80 percent water by weight (Reinhart says about 4 ounces of flour to about 3.2 ounces of water is good to start), or even as far down to 65 percent water to flour by weight for firm starters, which are great for sourdough. Tabor uses equal parts water to flour for a spongier starter suited for moist focaccia.

Stir the flour and water together thoroughly so there are no dry bits of flour. Cover the container loosely (you still want those airborne yeasts to be able to sneak in). Let the mixture sit at slightly above room temperature (about 70 degrees Fahrenheit is ideal) for 24 hours. For the first day, Reinhart will sometimes use pineapple juice or orange juice in place of water; “A little acidity at the beginning helps to further the process along, but it’s not necessary,” he explains.

©Cecilia von Weymarn/Adobe Stock

After the first day, the starter will require daily maintenance until it is ready to use. The basic routine is to stir the starter, “feed” the starter with water and flour, and discard excess starter (or share it with friends) as the mixture grows, bubbles, and ferments. Over the course of the day, most starter recipes recommend that it be fed as much flour and water as it started with. You may have to discard half the starter each day to keep the mixture balance and prevent the starter from bubbling over as it grows.

Like most bakers, Tabor and Reinhart’s strategies differ slightly. Tabor feeds and stirs his starter twice a day: once in the morning and once in the evening. Reinhart, on the other hand, recommends stirring the starter two to three times a day, but only feeding it every other day after the second feeding; be sure to scrape down the sides, he says, to keep nasty bacteria from growing.

“The biggest cause of losing a starter is mold infestation,” he explains. “The best way to prevent that is to agitate or stir the starter at least twice a day so there’s not any organisms that settle on the surface don’t have a chance to get a foothold.”

After a few days, the starter will begin bubbling and emitting a pleasant, slightly acidic aroma. It will take between five days to two weeks to prepare a starter from scratch depending on the environmental factors where you live (the temperature, for example, or the microbes in the air; Reinhart explains that in California wine country, where there is lots of wild yeast in the air, sourdough starters can come together in a few days).

When Tabor makes starter with his students, he has them use a Sharpie to mark the level each day on the outside of the container to see how much it’s increased in volume since the day before. “The rule of thumb is once the sourdough starter has tripled and quadrupled in its volume over a 24 hours period, it is ready to use for your bread,” he says.

Transfer your sourdough starter to its permanent home (cookware or plastic is fine; Reinhart says he even uses deli cups sometimes) and store it in the refrigerator. The cooler temperatures will slow the appetites of the microorganisms in the starter, but it is still important to feed your starter every few days with a scant cup of flour and half a cup of water.

“You have to be dedicated with it,” Tabor says. “If you let it sit for too long without feeding it, the yeast will have consumed all the sugars that are in there in the flour, once the yeast has consumed it all it will die.”

Tabor recommends leaving your starter with a neighbor who will feed it if you plan on going on an extended vacation.

Once you have a starter, though, it will improve the quality of your homemade bread and bring a little local flavor to your baked goods — literally.

“It takes a local airborne yeast and it incorporates it into the dough, and that’s what makes the dough bubbly and active,” Tabor says. “That’s where the flavor comes from.”

Sam Schipani loves pollinators, fresh herbs, and learning how to live more sustainably in small spaces. She has previously written for Sierra, Smithsonian, Earth Island Journal, and American Farm Publications.

If you’ve ever been to London’s Borough Market, chances are you couldn’t resist a stop at the now famous Bread Ahead bakery stall, piled high with sourdough loaves and those instafamous doughnuts. Founder, Matthew Jones, is a true baking master who not only operates stalls across London and supplies bread to hundreds of the city’s top restaurants, but also runs a lively baking school, teaching everything from the fundamentals of bread baking to courses on sourdough, puff pastry and more.

More of us than ever before have been learning to bake bread in lockdown, perhaps drawn to the promise of a fulfilling way to pass the time while learning a life skill, or the comfort of knowing you have the tools to bake your own bread whatever happens. Whatever the reason, there is a unique joy to be found in filling the home with the smell of homemade bread, but the path to a good loaf is not without its setbacks or conundrums. Why didn’t my dough rise? How do I knead properly? What does ‘knocking back’ mean? And, most common of all, what is a sourdough starter and what’s all this about ‘feeding’ it? The answers to all of these questions and more can be found in Baking School, Matthew’s cookbook co-written with Justin and Louise Gellatly, which is brimming with simple step-by-step recipes and guides that are so well written it’s like being in the Bread Ahead classroom. In this extract from the book you’ll get the definitive answers to all of those sourdough starter questions as well as a basic recipe to get yours going. We hope it will form the basis of many a satisfying loaf to come. And if it inspires you to pick up a copy of the book and take your baking to the next level, you can download a copy of the ebook here.

Over to Bread Ahead.

It’s important to relax about your sourdough starter – all you need is flour, water and time, plus the right conditions, which you can control! Don’t forget to name your starter, as it will become part of the family – our starter at Bread Ahead is called Bruce, after Canon Bruce Saunders, who was the first clergyman to bless our bread at Southwark Cathedral.

Here are our starter recipes as well as some pointers on how to look after it.

Don’t forget to download your copy of Baking School here.

Caring for your starter

What is a sourdough starter (aka ‘mother’)?

A sourdough starter is used to cultivate wild yeast in a form that we can use for baking. Since wild yeast is present in all flour (and in the air), the easiest way to make a starter is by combining flour and water and letting it sit for several days.

Which flours can I use to make a starter?

You can use any flour to make a starter, but we recommend using a wholegrain rye flour (and we use this in our production bakery). Rye starters tend to be a bit heartier and more resilient than their white counterparts.

How long does it take to make a starter?

It should take about 6 days to create a healthy, bubbly starter. By this point, your starter should have a honeycomb pattern of bubbles in it and a slightly alcoholic aroma.

How/where should I keep my starter when I’m making it?

During these first 6 days (when you’re feeding and growing your starter), it should be kept loosely covered at room temperature.

How/where should I keep my starter after the first 6 days?

If you’re not baking with your starter straight away, put it into the fridge, with the lid of the container firmly fastened. If you’re not baking regularly with your starter, you’ll need to give it a feed (50g of flour and 50g of water) every 2 weeks.

What if I’m going on holiday for more than 2 weeks?

You can freeze your starter. Once you’re ready to use it again, allow it to defrost at room temperature, and feed it daily (50g of flour and 50g of water) until it’s back to its bubbly self (this may take a few days).

What happens if liquid appears on top of my starter?

Don’t worry if this happens – it’s harmless and is referred to as ‘hooch’, which is naturally occurring alcohol. It’s basically your starter saying ‘I am hungry’ and ‘FEED ME’. The hooch can either be poured off or mixed back into your starter – we are ‘hooch in’ at Bread Ahead.

How do I know when my starter is no longer rescuable?

If your starter begins to smell like dirty nappies, or the result of a night on the Brussels sprouts, it’s time to throw it away and start again. Simply give it a stir (it will probably have a sizeable layer of hooch on it by this point in time), then transfer 50g to a new container (discard the rest) and feed it daily with 50g of water and 50g of flour until it’s bubbly and ready to use.

Once I’ve decided to bake a loaf of bread, when and how much should I feed my starter?

Once you decide you’re going to bake a loaf of bread, you’ll need to feed your starter 8–12 hours before you bake (if you’re using a wholegrain starter you’ll need to feed it at least 8 hours before; if you’re using a white starter, you’ll need to feed it at least 12 hours before). Take a look at your recipe, and if it calls for 150g of starter, feed your starter with 75g of flour and 75g of water so that the total volume of added ingredients is 150g. Then leave your starter out at room temperature, covered loosely, until you’re ready to use it.

What should I keep my starter in?

This largely comes down to personal preference. Kilner jars are a popular option, but we’ve kept very healthy starters in plastic pots for years without any problems.

How much starter should I generally keep?

Again, this largely comes down to personal preference, but we recommend keeping about 500g.

What is the difference between a starter and a stiff starter?

So from the rye starter we make our stiff starter – from Bruce to Son of Bruce. We use this stiff starter in many of our sourdoughs at Bread Ahead, feeding daily over 500kg. The main difference is, as the name suggests, that it is stiffer – with more flour and less water being used it is easy to handle, especially on a large scale. It still gives you a lovely depth of flavour for your sourdough – it’s really a matter of personal preference.

Now you’ve got that sourdough down, why not try these recipes from the book:

A beginner’s guide to getting start-ed with sourdough — how to create, feed and nurture the starter.

Words and recipes: Nicola Galloway

The term “sourdough” refers to both the delicious slightly sour bread as well as the starter, the culture that is used to kickstart the chemical reaction in breadmaking.

The starter (sometimes called a “pre-ferment” or a “mother”) is the product of the relationship between lactobacilli bacteria and yeast. Without an active starter, the bread won’t rise well.

The natural wild yeast needed to make a sourdough starter is predominantly found on flour, although it can be captured from the air. Use quality flour, preferably organic, as it contains more natural yeasts than non-organic flour. The more yeasts the better rise in the bread. A healthy starter contains wild yeast (for rising) and lactic-acid-producing bacteria (for flavour and starch conversion).

Stoneground wholemeal wheat flour is a good option or use a combination of 50 per cent wholemeal rye flour and 50 per cent organic white wheat flour.

TIP:

Rye can create a starter that is very active (which is a good thing). However, it’s more difficult for beginners as the yeasts expire more quickly than when using wheat flour and the starter is harder to keep alive.

How to make a sourdough starter

YOU WILL NEED

organic wholemeal wheat flour
warm non-chlorinated water at about 40°C (see tip)

Day 1: In a clean 400ml glass jar, combine 1 rounded tablespoon of flour with 1 tablespoon of warm water. Stir well to aerate. This incorporates oxygen into the mixture to assist with the fermentation.

Cover loosely with the lid – don’t screw on – to allow the starter to breathe while not forming a crust on the surface. Leave in a warm place – during summer the kitchen bench will be fine; in winter position the jar somewhere warm such as a sunny table, on top of the fridge or by the heater/ fire.

Days 2 and 4: For the next 3 days, feed the starter once every 24 hours (ideally at about the same time each day) with 1 rounded tablespoon of flour and 1 tablespoon water. Mix well with each addition and continue to sit in a warm position. During this time you will notice the starter will begin to “breathe” – rise and fall in the jar.

There should be small bubbles throughout and the starter should smell sweetly sour and yeasty (but not at all offensive). In cooler months, it may take 1 to 2 days extra to start bubbling. The starter is ready to use once it noticeably rises in the jar, doubling in height after 5 to 6 hours (make a mark on the jar after feeding to compare), with small bubbles visible throughout the mix.

TIP:

It’s important to use non-chlorinated water as the antibacterial quality of chlorine can create an imbalance in the microbes. Either use water through a carbon filter, boiled and cooled water, rainwater, or bottled water.

BE A GOOD MOTHER: LOOKING AFTER THE STARTER

1. Baking bread most days

Keep the starter at room temperature in a place where the temperature is relatively consistent – between 18 and 22°C is ideal. Continue to feed the starter every 12 to 24 hours with equal quantities of flour and water and keep covered loosely with a lid.

The amount of flour and water will depend on how often bread is made and how much starter is required. If baking bread daily, a good quantity for feeding is ¼ cup flour and 3 tablespoons water every 12 hours.

When baking every 1 to 2 days, feed with these quantities every 24 hours. It is better to keep the starter minimal so it is refreshed after each use, rather than have a large quantity where the yeast can be starved of food (flour). Always remember that the last preparatory feed needs to be 6 to 8 hours before preparing the dough.

2. Baking bread once or twice a week

Keep the starter in the fridge. This method will keep the starter “dormant” in between feeds so it only needs to be fed with equal quantities of flour and water at a maximum of every 7 days to keep it active.

After preparing bread dough, there should ideally be 1 to 2 tablespoons of starter remaining in the jar. Feed the starter with ¼ cup flour and 3 tablespoons water.Leave at room temperature for 2 to 3 hours until small bubbles appear. Loosely screw on the lid and place in the fridge.

When planning to prepare bread dough, take the starter out of the fridge 8 to 10 hours beforehand (allowing for 1 to 2 hours to come to room temperature) and feed straight from the fridge with ¼ cup flour and 3 tablespoons water, and stir. This will ensure the starter is active to use for making the dough.

SOURDOUGH RESCUE

If the starter becomes very sour and offensive smelling (this can happen if it is left on the bench unfed for several days), discard all but 1 to 2 tablespoons and scoop this into a new jar.

Feed with ¼ cup flour and 3 tablespoons water every 12 to 24 hours. After two feeds there will be about 200g starter in the jar ready to make bread plus some remaining in the jar. Making a batch of crumpets (see recipe below) will give the starter an extra boost if it is not doubling in height after each feed.