No Waste, 2 ingredient Sourdough Starter Recipe | 7-Day Step by Step (2024)

FAQs

Can I feed my sourdough starter without discarding any? ›

After day 7, do I keep discarding half of my sourdough starter? Nope! Once the sourdough starter is established on day 8, all you have to do is just give it flour and water. You no longer need to discard half of it.

There is no single best ratio, but I've found a ratio of 1:5:5 fed twice daily at 12-hour intervals to produce a sourdough starter that's strong and healthy. This ratio corresponds to 20% ripe starter carryover, 100% water, and 100% flour (a mix of whole grain rye and white flour) at each feeding.

A 100% hydration sourdough starter is a culture which is kept and fed with water and flour at equal weights. Like for instance 5 oz water to 5 oz flour. A 166% hydration starter is fed with equal volume of flour and water, which most typically is one cup of water (8.3 oz) and one cup of flour (5 oz).

The most common feeding ratio is 1:1:1 (sourdough starter: flour: water). This is also known as a 100% hydration starter. For example, let's say you have 40 g of sourdough starter in a jar. To feed it, you'll add 40 g of flour + 40 g of water.

If you have too much starter compared to the additional flour and water you're adding, your hungry starter consumes all the nutrients and then it's not as bubbly.

If you didn't discard a portion of your starter each time you feed it, two things would happen: Your starter would grow to an enormous, unmanageable size. Your starter would likely become more and more inhospitable to the bacteria and yeast we want as the mixture would become ever more acidic.

How to increase a starter. If your recipe calls for more than 227g (about 1 cup) of starter, feed it without discarding until you've reached the amount you need (plus 113g to keep and feed again).

One only needs to discard when making a starter from scratch because it needs daily feeds for a week or two before it's strong enough to make bread. If one doesn't discard then before long you'll have a swimming pool of starter.

All-purpose Flour

It strikes a perfect balance of softness and structure, making it an ideal choice for various recipes. Due to its wide availability and affordability, all-purpose flour is often my top recommendation for creating and maintaining a sourdough starter.

Proportions: Here are our preferred proportions for feeding the starter: Take a smidgen of starter (5-10 grams). (Throw away the rest — or you can bake with it if it's ready!) Add to it 100g of water, at 80-85 F degrees.

How often should I stir my sourdough starter? ›

It is important that you stir the sourdough starter every day in the morning and in the evening. Feed the starter.

Essentially making a sourdough starter is not an overly difficult process, but it does require a commitment of time and patience, as well as some dedicated equipment. Sometimes there are factors which mean making sourdough starter could be difficult. Perhaps you're working long hours or go out of town regularly.

All you need to do is take 20g of the starter you already have and then feed it with 20g of flour and 20g of water (so 1:1:1). Then you'll have a 60g starter, which is considered a smaller amount. You can of course reduce these amounts even further if you wish, but this is a reasonable size to keep waste to a minimum.

Creating a healthy and vibrant sourdough starter can take anywhere from 7 to 14 days depending on several factors. The temperature of your kitchen is the most important factor to consider. Starters thrive in a warm environment, ideally around 75°F (24°C).

Although you need an active, well-maintained starter for certain artisan breads, you can still make tasty bread with a sluggish, slow starter so you don't have to discard sourdough starter daily. In fact, many of my favorite sourdough bread recipes use discard for flavoring to give bread that classic tang.

A healthy sourdough starter means great bread. Despite all the mysticism and lore about creating the concoction, a sourdough starter is merely a naturally fermenting mixture of flour and water.

A starter stored in the fridge can be fed once a week. If you plan to use it often, you can store it for up to two months without feeding. When you want to use the starter again, remove it from the fridge for a few hours, then feed it every 12 hours for 36 hours before you make bread with it.