Sourdough Starter the Easy Way that Actually Works with LESS Flour

Making a sourdough starter does not have to be complicated and you don't have to have this huge vessel of starter that you're feeding huge amounts of flour to all the time .

This is my sourdough starter that I have had for over 10 years .

And this is how much I keep on hand , which is a very small amount and just a pint size jar .

Sourdough starters are actually really easy to use and to start once you know the exact things that you need .

And I'm here to tell you most people really overcomplicate it .

My friend , all you need is flour and water .

Now you can use a scale if you want to .

And in the beginning using a scale is going to get you a lot of accuracy , but honestly , you don't have to use it .

I'll give you the measurements without having a scale , but you're gonna get to the point where you can just eyeball it and know if it's at the right hydration level , which is what kind of a fancy term you'll hear people talk about a lot with sourdough baking , what the hydration level is .

And I like mine at 100% hydration .

And all that means is it's equal parts flour and water by weight , which you can tell by looking at when it's thick .

So to start a sourdough starter from scratch , all you need is water and flour .

You don't need any type of special flour .

I do recommend using unbleached flour if possible because what we're doing is we're not actually capturing the yeast from the air , but the yeast is already on your flower .

And so unbleached is ideal because you're gonna have a better colony of yeast stary there .

And then we're just creating an environment for it to and grow into our sourdough starter .

This is unbleached organic , all purpose flour .

You can use whole wheat .

A lot of people like to use rye .

You can also do ancient grain , iron corn , you can do spelt and you can do gluten free if you're doing gluten free .

I like to use a rice flour .

Buckwheat's popular quinoa also works .

I stay away from nut flowers because you do want the starch for both the yeast and the lacto , which is the good bacteria which creates our sourdough culture for them to feed on .

So to start your sourdough starter , all you're gonna need is a quarter cup of flour and you don't have to have exact measurements .

I promise sourdough starter doesn't have to be that complicated .

So we've got a quarter cup of flour which if you have a scale is gonna be 30 g .

And then we're gonna use two tablespoons of water , which would be 30 g if you're weighing it on the scale and we're just gonna stir that together and we're gonna incorporate it .

I do recommend glass mason jar works great .

But if you have like a glass bowl or a different type of glass jar , that's totally fine .

So you're just gonna mix this and it's gonna be kind of like a thick paste .

Now , it's totally fine if you need to add just a little bit more water so that you have all of the flour incorporated .

Basically , what we don't want is any little dry , clumps of flour .

We want all of the flour to have moisture .

So I'm just gonna add another little bit of a tablespoon of water to this .

Now , if you're on a well water that's fine to use .

If your water has a lot of chlorine in it , I would recommend either boiling it and then letting it come to room temperature or you can let it sit out overnight to off gas .

But you don't need to go and buy any type of special water .

So you can see this is pretty thick .

It's not really runny and then we just need to cover it .

Now , we don't want it to be airtight , it does need oxygen to breathe .

And so you can , if you have plastic wrap , you can use plastic wrap .

I don't like to use plastic wrap .

What I like to use are just these white plastic lids .

They're not air tight , they're reusable freezer , safe , fridge , safe , all those fun things .

And I just kind of set it on there and I don't always , I don't screw it all the way down , so it definitely has room to breathe .

Now , I , when you're doing a brand new sourdough starter , I like to feed it twice a day .

So you're gonna do this in the morning and then you're gonna feed it again in the evening and a warm spot is best to especially help get it active .

So if your house is cold , my house is usually pretty cold in the winter time , then you can just use an oven with just the light on .

And that makes a great little proofing box , keeps it warm heat rises .

So the top of your fridge is a good place .

But if your house is 70 F or warmer , you're fine just at room temperature .

So this is approximately 12 hours later , please do not set your clock and alarm by it .

You just want to have a , you know , evening and morning ideally .

So we're gonna come back and we're gonna feed this with the same exact amount .

So a quarter cup of flour or 30 g and 30 g of water .

And I always like to make sure that I scrape the sides of the jar so that it's all getting stirred and incorporated .

There we go .

That is day one feeding complete .

OK .

So for day two , this is where you do the discard part .

This card simply means we are gonna be removing half of the amount of the starter that's in the jar .

Now , it doesn't mean that you're wasting this .

And if you want to get really technical , like you can weigh and measure it out .

As I said , I am not technical with my sour dough .

We're just gonna eyeball this and I'm approximately leaving about a quarter cup or so in there and we're just gonna remove a half of it .

So this is not technically sourdough starter yet because it's only day two .

This is just flour and water .

So you can use this in any baking recipe , throw it in .

If you're making pancakes or a cake or cookies or bread or whatever , it's just flour and water , there's no need to throw this away or toss it .

You can also set this in the fridge because you're gonna be discarding once a day and build up enough of this to make something else if you like , I don't really have anything that I'm gonna be using just a quarter cup of flour in .

Now it's time for the first feeding on day two and it's the exact same amounts every time that we've been using .

So a quarter cup of flour and our water mix that all in and your jar is starting to look like a true sourdough starter jar and getting a little bit of flour up on it .

Get a little messy looking .

There we go .

And then we'll come back and feed this again on the evening of day two .

Now you will probably start to see a few bubbles .

And that is a really good thing that is showing that it's active .

So sometimes you'll see bubbles on the sides of the jar and sometimes you'll also see them on the top .

And these are all signs that we're looking for .

Now , don't panic if you're moving into day two , when you're like , I don't see any bubbles yet .

Just keep up with the feeding and the stirring and the discarding .

Now , like I said , with the discard , the reason that you need to do that is because if you don't , the culture that's beginning to form , it's not strong enough yet to support all of this flour .

And so that's why we're moving that out and adding in fresh fe fresh food or feed .

We're feeding it .

It is a , a live live culture there of the yeast and the lactobacillus bacteria .

And so if you don't remove this , it's really hard for it to become active in a really strong starter .

You're gonna be hindering it if you don't remove and discard every day .

So day three , we're gonna do some more discarding and you should begin to see some bubbles at this point .

So you're gonna continue in the same vein for five days .

Now , at the end of five days , your starter is not strong enough to bake bread yet , but it is considered a sourdough starter at day five .

So you can begin to use this discard and the starter in any type of sour dough recipe .

That isn't a bread recipe or roll recipe that requires the action .

These to rise so quick breads and pancakes and waffles .

And if you want to get my sourdough feeding schedule then written out for you .

You can go to the blog post , I'll have it linked beneath the video so you can go and check that out there .

So you have it all written out with the amounts and some of those either once a day or twice a day feedings .

Now , often times in the beginning people will see their sourdough starter sometimes like around day three or four , be really , really active .

Like you'll see a huge explosion of bubbles and it will be rising and falling and you'll think , oh my gosh , this must be strong enough to make bread .

It's not yet .

It's still too infant .

It's not going to rise and make good bread , but this is very common .

And what will happen for a lot of people is then you'll begin to get to like day five and six and you won't see nearly the amount of bubbles or actions .

And people think that that means that they're sourdough sort of something's wrong with it and it's dying and they'll often times give up and throw it out , please don't do that .

It's very normal .

And that's why we don't use our sourdough starter for bread yet because it's still very much in its infancy and it's getting the balance down of those cultures until it's a strong culture and it's predictable enough to bake bread .

So don't give up .

And if you accidentally miss a day of feeding , it , don't worry about it , just discard down and go back to the feeding schedule .

As soon as you remember , sourdough starters are actually very , very forgiving .

People just give up on them a lot too soon .

If you already have a sourdough starter , I highly recommend checking out my sour dough , chocolate bread .

It is delicious .

And if you want some more recipes , you can go and check out that written blog post and snag some of them as well .