Starting a Starter
What is starter?
Starter is the single most important ingredient in baking sourdough successfully; it is the life force, the wild yeast that allows the bread to ferment and rise when baking. Starter consists of two ingredients: (1) Flour, (2) Water. By following this simple schedule you should have your very own active natural yeast with which to bake the most satisfyingly delicious homemade bread.
What is fermentation?
Fermentation is the process by which the starches in flour become available to the lactic acid bacteria (LAB) that naturally exist in the flour by adding water. The LAB consume the available sugars which get converted into alcohol through their digestion. The by-product of the digested sugars is carbon dioxide which produces those distinctive air bubbles (alveoli) of naturally leavened bread.
Procedure
Equipment Used
Kitchen scale - the only way to achieve consistent results with baking
Clean wide-mouth mason jar with lid
Silicon spatula
Spoon
Ingredients
10 grams water
10 grams whole wheat flour
DAY 0
Begin by weighing the empty mason jar (without the lid). It helps to take a permanent marker pen to write the weight (in grams) of the jar.
Tare (zero) the scale with the jar and add the flour and water.
Use the spatula to mix the ingredients until well combined and no dry bits of flour are left. Loosely place the lid on the jar and leave the jar in a warm spot (ideally 72 - 78 deg F) for 24 hours.
DAY 1
You now have a mixture of 20 grams (10 grams water + 10 grams flour). Add equal parts flour and water to the 20 gram mixture. That is 20 grams mix from Day 0 + 20 grams flour + 20 grams water.
Use the spatula to mix the ingredients until well combined and no dry bits of flour are left. Loosely place the lid on the jar and leave the jar in a warm spot (ideally 72 - 78 deg F) for 24 hours.
DAY 2
You now have a mixture of 60 grams. If you continue adding equal parts flour and water to the mixture each day, you essentially triple your volume every feeding. In order to control the volume of starter you can choose to “discard” a portion of the mixture so you don’t end up drowning in starter. Therefore, discard approximately 40 grams of your mixture. It is recommended to start with the same quantity as on Day 1. This leaves you with 20 grams of the mixture. Add equal parts flour and water to the 20 gram mixture.
Use the spatula to mix the ingredients until well combined and no dry bits of flour are left. Loosely place the lid on the jar and leave the jar in a warm spot (ideally 72 - 78 deg F) for 24 hours.
DAYS 3 - 7
Follow the same procedure daily for a full week. Monitor the jar as the days pass to become familiar with the starter’s life cycle. At the end of a week you should notice bubbling in the mixture. Once the starter shows proper signs of activity you can start to use it as the natural leaven for your first sourdough loaf!
FAQs
It’s been a week and my starter looks dead. What happened?
Keep feeding it as described. As long as you are using a kitchen scale and the temperature in which the starter is stored is not extremely hot or cold.
Ensure that the flour being used to start the starter is a whole grain rather than all purpose flour. Whole grain flours contain the soluble fiber (from the bran and germ) that the LAB are much happier to feed on than just the protein and sugar from the endosperm (wheat).
