Starting a sourdough starter Days 1 - 21 and beyond...

When starting a sourdough starter the best advice I can give is learn lots of patience and trust the process.

Day 1 & 2 – Mix equal parts flour and water, by weight, in a jar. (If you don’t have a scale to use keep in mind that water generally weighs about twice as much as the flour you will be using. So if you’re using cups….1 measure of flour – 1/4 cup – to 1/2 measure of water – 1/8 cup.) What I use:

A small wide mouth mason jar
All-purpose unbleached flour – Some insist it must be bread flour, or whole wheat flour, or some other type of “high protein” flour. I use all-purpose unbleached flour. It’s not as expensive as the other types of flour and I’m just cultivating the wild yeast and “good” bacteria. I’ll use the “other” flour for baking for flavor. (Keep in mind you’ll be going though a lot of flour in the beginning to get your starter going and maintaining it until it’s mature enough to put in the fridge. Then you’ll be able to change up your starter maintenance schedule to weekly or even bi-weekly.)
Filtered water from the fridge – I do fill a gallon water jug with the filtered fridge water to leave on counter so it’s room temperature when I use it.
Round paper coffee filters
A scale that measures in grams
A butter knife to mix it all up. (I started with 50 grams of flour and water. You could start with 25 grams of each, with the same results.)

You can mix the flour and water at any time you want. Think of your upcoming schedule as you’ll be “feeding” the starter twice a day for about 3 months. Mix the flour and water together, then put the coffee filter over the top, put the screw-on ring over the filter, and screw onto the jar. This helps keep gnats and other bugs from getting into the mixture as it “ripens”. (Yep, sad news, sourdough starters do attract those nasty gnats. So be prepared.) Leave on the counter. (You will leave it on the counter during this initial stage the entire time you’re feeding it twice a day.) During the first 48 hours, when you think about it, stir the flour and water a bit to add some air in. The “new born” starter likes a little air mixed in from time to time. If you keep the rim clean and dry, you can continue to use the same coffee filter and ring to keep the jar covered. If you’re like me, you’ll be checking on it frequently when at home, so just give it a stir when you do. You may even see some tiny bubbles!

Days 3 though 8 – You want to toss 1/2 of the flour/water mixture. Don’t put it down the drain! It may clog it and (from what I’ve heard) will cost a small fortune to get the drain unclogged. Remember, paper mache paste is just water and flour. That’s pretty much what would be clogging the drain. You can put the amount of starter you’re going to toss into a cup and dilute it. Then feed it to your house plants, outdoor garden, or compost pile. This is where the scale comes in handy…weigh/measure your remaining “starter”, should be about 50 grams. (If you want…you can give your starter a name…it’s going to become like a child to you. My daughter calls my starter “the surviving twin” -see “about” page.) You want to “feed” your starter the same weight for both flour and water. So if you start with 50 grams water/50 grams flour…you have 100 grams total mix. You toss 1/2 leaving you with 50 grams. So you will add 50 grams each of water and flour you will now have 150 grams total. This is called feeding with a 1:1:1 ratio…1 part starter, 1 part flour, & 1 part water. You will feed in this way twice a day for 5 more days (total 6 days). Note how long the mixture is taking to rise and begin it’s decline. Don’t get discouraged if towards the end of this period the mixture stops rising or getting bubbly. Keep feeding it. She’s just using her strength to work out some kinks. Once the “fight” is over, she’ll start rising again!

Days 9 through 30 – You might start to get excited as your starter may start to show some movement…rising up…or lots of small bubbles. This is a good thing! You want to toss (or “discard”) 2/3 of your starter and feed it equal parts of water & flour twice a day through day 22. We’re still building strength during this time. Don’t rush it…slow and steady. Now, the good news, you can start saving the amount of starter you were tossing out or feeding to your garden. This is called the “discard”. I wish I would have known how much of this stuff I’d be producing during this starter strengthening time! I would have used a large bowl with a cover instead of so many large mason jars that they took over my fridge. You can use this “discard” for baking at this point (and feeding your plants and compost pile). Crackers, breads, cinnamon rolls, croissants, English muffins, bagels, cakes, & cookies. The items made with the discard will also use additional ingredients to help the dough rise. It’s not quite strong enough yet to actually raise a loaf of bread on it’s own.

Days 31 – 60 – Continue as you have. If your starter is rising and falling consistently within 4 – 6 hours (depending on the temperature of the room your starter is in) you can try a sourdough loaf. At this stage the bread won’t have a very strong sourdough flavor as it’s not mature enough to produce the sour taste yet. But it helps to practice to start getting the techniques down.

Days 61 – 90 – Continue as you have. When your sourdough loaves you’re baking produce the sourdough taste you’ve been looking for. That’s when you know your starter is mature enough to bake the breads you want. (Some will say to continue the twice a day feeding for 6 months. That’s a lot of flour and a lot of discard baking. Some will say you don’t need to do the twice a day feedings for more than a couple weeks. I tried that…flat breads and not very flavorful. I didn’t start selling the breads I make until I achieved the sour taste I had come to expect from a sourdough bread. That’s how I determined when my starter was actually ready to bake with and was strong enough to put in the refrigerator. Only feeding a day or two before I planned to bake.

If your starter is constantly rising and falling within your 12 hour feeding you’re ready to bake your sourdough breads! Good luck and have fun. Some things I wish I had known at the beginning of this adventure:

Room temperature will definitely affect how both your starter and your dough rise. Warm room equals a faster rise, cool room equals a slower rise. Use this to your advantage so your bread baking will work with your schedule.
Basic sourdough bread is always only three ingredients: Flour (100%), Water (as a percent of flour), and Salt (as a percent of flour). Water determines the hydration level. Figure out the hydration level you like to work with. Higher hydration has a more open crumb (larger holes) than a lower hydration. Salt is always to taste. For me…if I can taste the salt…it’s too much salt. I’ll reduce the amount of salt in the next bake. If the bread has “no flavor” I’ll increase the salt just a bit. To the “basic” recipe you can always add additional flavors such as nuts, fruits, cheese, vegetables (peppers), herbs, & spices…Adding these will affect the hydration of the dough so keep this in mind when adding.
Find one recipe you like and work with it until you are getting consistent results. You’re going to have not so good breads, you’re going to have great breads. Work the same recipe until you have consistent successes. For the most part the problem isn’t the recipe but the techniques. It will take some time to learn how to “read” the dough. Adjust water, bulk ferment times, cold retard times, bake time, bake temp, how often you handle the dough, how you handle the dough, & the temp. All these factor into the outcome of your bake. I do have a “form” I use to keep track so I know what is working and what’s not. Someday I hope to have consistently good loaves. For now…I’m about 70% consistent. But I’m still learning…the patience part….I’m still learning to be patient!
IF you see pink, green, or fuzzy grey in your starter. Toss it. It’s mold. Although, I have been reading some recent articles that indicate you can scrape off the mold and use the bottom portion of the starter (if it’s not too moldy) and continue as the healthy bacteria and yeast will kill off the mold spores. Not sure about you…but I’m not ready to risk a mold infection until there’s a bit more back up to test that theory.
Don’t get discouraged. My starter appeared to do absolutely NOTHING from day 7 through day 21. Facebook sourdough groups told me to add a bit of rye flour, or bread flour, or feed using a 1:2:2 ratio (50 grams starter, 100 grams each water and flour), and some other “tips and tricks” they had learned. But I’m stubborn. Was told this would work…so I just kept feeding 1:1:1 twice a day….for 2 months…and suddenly, sometime between the 12th week and the 16th week she took off. Slowed the feedings down to once a day and she was fine. After 5 months I started putting her in the fridge and feeding a night or two before I planned to bake. She still appears to be happy, and I’m still baking with her, it’s almost her 1st birthday. I probably should give her a name sometime before that birthday…(Pictured is the jar I started with. I have since started using a smaller jar. I have yet to have my starter overflow my smaller jar.)
If you need to leave for a few days during this “development” stage of your starter. Don’t fret! Put the starter in the fridge and resume when you return. My starter was a month old and I had to leave for a week. Came back and continued the twice a day feeding. Was still able to bake a decent loaf within 90 days of my starter’s “birth”.
And by no means is this the only way to start a sourdough starter. Just my take on the process as I see so many questioning what’s going on at the various stages. Hang in there. The bubbles will come…
And Finally…relax…have fun…experiment. It’s almost impossible to kill a strong starter. But, as soon as you can…spread some of that starter out very thinly on a piece of parchment paper and let it dry. Once dry crumble up and put in an air tight bag or jar. Keep the jar indefinitely in a cool, dry, dark place. This can be re-hydrated in a couple of days and you’re good to go if anything does happen to your starter.
The internet is full of recipes and “how to” for sourdough. Take some from here and some from there and make it your own.
I’m not an expert…and most likely never will be…This is what as worked for me so far in my sourdough adventure. Sourdough baking isn’t as stringent or strict as I originally thought it was. Honestly, you don’t have to spend an hour to get your water to be exactly 50 grams. It’s really ok if it’s 48, 49, 51, or 52 grams…everything will still be fine! (Yes, I actually did that…a whole HOUR trying to get exactly 50 grams!) For salt…my go to recipe calls for 10 grams of salt. If I measure out 8…that’s good enough for me because I KNOW trying to get those other 2 grams I’m going to go over…and I prefer less salt.

Websites I’ve used to get to this point: