Sam's Sourdough 101
Some of my favorite cookbooks
I get requests for Sam’s sourdough weekly and we finally sat down to get it all written our for you! This is a family favorite and if you have it on your new year list to learn to make sourdough he’s here to help!
A couple of Christmases ago I got Sam everything he would need to make sourdough and suffice it to say it’s the gift that keeps on giving.
This is Sam! Is there anything better on planet earth than a fresh baked loaf of homemade sourdough bread!? With it’s crunchy crust and lightly tangy taste, sourdough bread is having a huge moment right now, and rightly so! But did you know you can use sourdough to make just about any baked good? From crackers and biscuits, to pizza and cinnamon rolls, using a sourdough starter is a super versatile way to get your baked goods to rise without using yeast. And since your sourdough starter is slightly fermented, the gluten content in your baked goods is lightly pre-digested (weird I know) by the starter and can be a bit easier on sensitive stomachs.
But all of this delicious potential hinges on the quality and health of your sourdough starter.
So what is a sourdough starter? A sourdough starter is a live culture with active bacteria used to leaven (rise) bread. That’s it. No magic. And the best news is that with proper (and easy) maintenance, your sourdough starter can last just about forever! More on maintenance later, for now, let’s make our first starter!
Things you’ll need to make your starter:
Unbleached all purpose flour organic or not (this is what we use)
Filtered water
Let’s get start-ed (get it), but first a couple notes. With sourdough (and probably baking in general) you’ll see recipes written out like 1:1:1 or 1:2:2, etc. This refers to the ratio of starter : flour : water by weight in grams.
Day 1: Mix flour and water
Combine 50g of flour and 50g of water (1:1) in your glass jar. You do not want your glass jar to be airtight so if you are using the jar linked above, take the rubber gasket out of the lid. Or, if you are using a screw on lid, don’t use the metal lid, but use a piece of a paper towel. Seal your jar (again, not air tight) and leave the flour / water mix out at room temperature (70-75 degrees F is perfect)
Days 2-3: Stir and Feed
After 24 hours, you might start seeing tiny bubbles in your new starter. This is great! Stir the starter to aerate.
Discard half of the mix and feed with 1:1 flour / water (50g each)
Days 4-7:
Repeat the steps you completed in days 2-3, stirring and feeding the starter each day. By day 5, your starter should double in size within 4-6 hours of feeding. It should be quite bubbly and have a pleasantly tangy smell.
By day 7, your starter should rise predictably within 4-6 hours of feeding and should have that lovely tangy sourdough scent. If this is the case, congratulations! You have a sourdough starter that is ready for use!
How to maintain your sourdough starter
If you bake frequently (~daily), you can leave your starter out on the counter and feed it daily with equal parts flour:water. The ratios here are up to you. If you are using a lot of starter, feed it a lot. Somewhere from 75g to 100g flour:water should work. If you need more, feed it more. If you need less, feed it less.
If you are baking infrequently (~1x / week or less) store your starter in the fridge.
As you go to bake (or once a week even if you aren’t baking), use what you need from your existing starter, discard half of what is left (if this feels wasteful, you can always gift your discard to friends who want to get started.
After discarding, feed your starter 1:1 flour / water. I normally do 50-75g each.
Oh no! I went on vacation and forgot to feed my starter for a couple weeks! No big deal. If you forget to feed your starter for 2-3 weeks, this is usually not a problem.
On the surface of your starter, you may see a layer of brownish / grayish liquid. This is called hooch and is simply a byproduct of fermentation. This is harmless and can be tossed out or even mixed back in to the starter. I have forgotten about my starter a few times, and I toss the hooch, stir the starter, discard, and feed per usual.
You may also notice that the water and flour start dividing into layers, or that your overall mix has a slightly beige or brown tone. No biggy. Stir, discard, feed, and move on.
Here is what to look for in a starter that is too far gone.
Black, orange, or pink color to the mix.
Rotten or putrid smell
Mold - fuzzy spots, green, black, pink, or orange areas. Mold cannot be safely removed from your starter. Time to toss.
Using your sourdough starter!!!
Your sourdough starter is the foundation of your levain. Remember, your levain is what causes the bread to rise.
There are 2 “versions” of sourdough starter - fed & unfed (discard).
Fed starter - Your recipe will almost always instruct you on how and what to feed your starter. If it does not provide feeding instructions, a good jumping off point is 30g starter, 140g all purpose flour, 125g filtered water and leave it at room temp (70-75F) for 6-8 hours. This will yield about 200-250g of levain. Your starter is considered fed when it has at least doubled in size and is very bubbly. Always use your levain when it is at it’s peak or just before it peaks. After you’ve fed your starter a few times, you’ll get a feel for what it looks like when it’s at its peak.
Unfed starter - Whether refrigerated or not, unfed starter is simply what is in your jar before you feed it. Again, this is usually what you toss out before feeding.
Sourdough gets this reputation of being this magical and difficult thing to take care of, but it’s really not at all difficult. It just requires a bit of forethought and care. Listen, I am an abysmal baker. I hate following instructions, and I have the attention span of a goldfish. If I can do this, you absolutely can! Share with us all your success (or failure!) stories! We’d love to cheer you on! Happy sourdough-ing!
Q&A
Q: I was gifted a starter from a friend and I can’t get it to rise. What do I do?
A: When you feed your starter it’s crucial to leave it out at room temperature (70-75 degrees F) for about 8 hours. Follow the steps outline above - stir, discard half, feed 1:1 four / water, stir, let sit out 8 hours. After a few days, I bet it’ll come back from the dead!
Q: It’s winter and my house stays colder than 70 degrees inside. Will my starter not rise?
A: I feel you! Our house is cold too. I’m writing this in January wearing 2 pairs of pants, t shirt, sweatshirt, flannel jacket, wool poncho (hood up), and a blanket! To solve for a cold house you’ve got a few options.
1. Wait longer for the starter to rise. I promise it will, but for every degree below 70, it adds more time to the rising process.
2. I put a small space heater in our laundry room, crack the door and leave my starter in there to rise. This requires a little trial and error because if it’s too hot the starter will rise too quickly, if it’s too cold it won’t rise quickly enough. Do it a few times and you’ll figure out
3. Put it in the oven. Some ovens have a proof feature. This has come in handy for us a few times. Just be warned it’s usually a bit hotter than room temp. I wouldn’t leave my starter in there for more than a 2-3 hours at most. Also, you can put it in the oven and leave the oven light on. The light will add some heat to the oven and help your starter rise up!
Q: Best way to get started? I’m so intimidated!
A: Best way to start is to just start, and don’t be afraid to fail! You will either get it right, or you’ll learn something. A great place to begin is to just tinker with your starter. Feed it and see what happens. Does it mature in 4 hours or 8? Is your kitchen too cold / too hot? Also, try out some discard recipes. They can be more forgiving because they don’t require you to perfectly time the rise of your levain.
Q: Why do we stretch and fold instead of kneading?
A: If you think about it, stretching and folding is sort of like kneading, just not as intense. The act of stretching develops the gluten and provides structure to your bread, while folding traps in air bubble which aids in the fermentation process. Also, the nature of sourdough is that it has a bit of chewiness to it. If you kneaded sourdough the texture would be overly chewy.
Q: Timing. It’s so hard to time it right around life.
A: You are so right! Discard recipes are more forgiving in this regard since they don’t require you to create and time a levain. Fed recipes…not so much. Personally, I won’t commit to bringing a sourdough item to a party / get together without having done at least one trial run before hand. Does this mean sometimes I have to bake sourdough cinnamon rolls a couple times before I’ll bring them to a party? Yes! Is that ok? Oh yes! Many recipes will provide a baker’s schedule which is very helpful. Here’s a copy of a baker’s schedule I created for our rustic sourdough loaf recipe.
Q: Burned bottom of the loaf even with parchment and water in the bottom of the dutch oven.
A: Without knowing how thick your dutch oven is or your recipe that’s a little harder to diagnose. I do a 2 stage bake - 500 degrees for 22 minutes lid on, 465 for 22 minutes lid off. I only preheat the dutch oven as long as my oven takes to preheat. Also, prior to baking, my bread is in the fridge doing a second proof so it’s probably below room temp before going in the oven. If you’re already doing all of that maybe try adding a layer of rice on the bottom of your dutch oven so the bread isn’t making direct contact. Even a couple sheets of foil between the bottom of your parchment paper and the cast iron might help. Good luck!
Q: How can you tell if it’s proved enough. Sometimes it’s sticky and doesn’t hold it’s shape.
A: This is something you kind of have to develop a feel for. During bulk ferment, in my bread bowl, if the dough is less that half way up the bowl, I’m under proofed. If this is the case, I’ll pop it in our oven on the proof setting for about 30 minutes to an hour and that’ll pop it up pretty quick. It it’s touching the Saran Wrap I’ve way over proofed it. If this happens, I’ll leave it in the fridge for longer than normal during my second proof before baking and hope for the best. If it’s overly sticky you may want to perform more stretch and fold cycles to build up the gluten content before you bulk ferment. Also, your recipe may call for too much hydration or the flour may not have enough protein content. Give our recipe a whirl and see if you have better results.
