In a world of processed food, baking your own bread at home from just three natural ingredients could be considered a revolutionary act! It's not only healthier, it's also much easier than you might think. Want to know more? Read on!
In this post we're covering sourdough basics, and how to make your own sourdough starter. It'll be continued in Sourdough Part 2: Baking Bread.
Contents:
Bread has been a part of human life for thousands upon thousands of years and, understandably, it still stirs something deep within us. Whether it's the sense of homeliness in kneading the dough, or the comfort and aroma of a freshly-baked loaf, breadmaking evokes all sorts of feel-good emotions in our brains.
In this post, we're delving into how to make sourdough bread. It's long! You might want a cup of tea while you read. Hopefully though, it'll give you the basics of how to give it a go yourself. Remember too, instructions, recipes and how-to's are just a starting point. Adjust, tweak, and use it as a basis to find your own way.
So, what actually is sourdough? It's bread made using wild yeasts instead of the cultivated sort used in the vast majority of breadmaking these days. Cultivated yeast is quick and predictable, so is favoured in commercial bread production. Sourdough is slow and needs plenty of time to produce good results. The wild yeasts and bacteria, together with time help wonderful flavours to develop. It also helps to break down the gluten in the flour, making sourdough bread easier to digest and more beneficial for gut health.
To start, let's look briefly at how breadmaking began - after all, it's nice to understand the history behind this ancient practice and its place in modern life. In this post, we'll also cover the equipment needed (not much!), how to make your own starter from scratch (not difficult!), and how to find your own routine for baking wonderful sourdough loaves at home (much easier than you'd think).
The History of Breadmaking, Briefly!
The oldest evidence of bread found so far is from Jordan and dates from 14,000 years ago. The charred crumbs were discovered in an ancient fireplace and were from some kind of flatbread like a wrap, pitta, or chapatti which was made from wild grains (possibly wild einkorn) and mashed clubrush roots which had been baked in the hearth ashes.
Alongside other finds of unleavened bread, from Asia through to Europe, there is extensive evidence of bread production in Egypt around 2,000-1,000 BC. In amongst it, some of the lighter bread was leavened - fermented using wild yeasts... in other words, it was sourdough bread.
Einkorn, emmer and, particularly, spelt seem to have been common ingredients in ancient bread. Spelt was widely cultivated in Britain from the Bronze Age to the Roman period. After the Romans, there was a shift in crops and the emphasis was on bread wheat, barley, rye, and oats being grown instead. The lightest, whitest loaves for the wealthiest classes were baked using bread wheat, closer to how we know it today. Bread wheat mixed with barley gave a brown loaf, and rye mixed with other cereals gave a darker loaf.
The cheapest loaves for the poorer people would have been made from maslin flour. This was a mix of various cereals (usually wheat and rye) together with oats, barley and sometimes pulse flours from beans and peas. Adding the cheaper ingredients helped to stretch the expensive wheat flour but it also made the loaves dark, dense and (ironically) nutritionally much richer than the white bread reserved for the wealthy. The loaves were also longer-lasting and had a stronger flavour.
Maslin was commonly used as far back, at least, as the 12th century and was generally associated with the lower classes. As milling improved and wheat became more easily available, its use began to slowly decline by the 17th century, though it remained a staple food, especially in rural areas, until well into the 18th century.
Interestingly, there's a modern interpretation of maslin flour that takes the concept further. The Sourdough School has created what they call their "Meadow Blend Flour" – it's a blend that includes ancient grains like einkorn, spelt, and emmer alongside barley, oats, and peas, but then adds an extra dimension by incorporating dried edible flowers, petals, and even dried nettles. It's like milling the whole meadow rather than just the monoculture of wheat.
There's something deeply poetic about incorporating meadow flowers and wild herbs into our daily bread, reconnecting us with the landscape in much the same way our ancestors would have been connected to their local grain supplies. A bag goes a long way as you only need to use roughly 10-20% of the Meadow Blend flour mixed with your usual bread flour. Unfortunately, the blends are only currently available in the UK (through the lovely Hodmedods shop). (At the time of posting, they're sold out but they assure me they'll be milling more in a few days!)
Back to the story of bread ... To reliably and easily leaven bread, the old time method—dating back at least as far as the ancient leavened loaves of Egypt—was to save a piece of dough from the previous batch and use it to ferment the next. The saved portion would contain wild yeasts and bacteria, which would then get to work on the new dough. This "old dough" method was used for centuries and is most likely the way our great-great-grannies (and beyond) would have baked bread.
Understanding Sourdough Starters
In more modern times, we've gradually replaced the "old dough" method with keeping a sourdough starter in a jar. A starter contains the same live culture of wild yeast and bacteria that the "old dough" contained, but in a more easily managed way, making it easier to feed and maintain.
It's very simple to make your own sourdough starter completely from scratch at home with just a container, some flour, and water. The magic comes from the air around us and the wild yeasts it contains. The yeast feeds on the flour, breaking it down from complex carbohydrates into simpler sugars, creating bubbles of carbon dioxide as it does so – and this is what gives the bread its characteristic bubbles and lift.
Lactic acid, found naturally within the air and on flour, also plays an important part by adding acidity. The acidity creates an environment which naturally inhibits the growth of harmful bacteria and also gives the bread its wonderful and characteristic tangy flavour.
With the right care, you can keep a starter going indefinitely. And don't worry about keeping an old starter - just because a starter might be ten years old doesn't mean the ingredients are ten years old. I'll explain with some maths. Imagine you feed your starter every day, and you're removing half of the existing starter and replacing it with the same weight of new flour and water. As an example, my starter weighs 200g in total.
Day 1: 100% (200g) of the original ingredients
Day 2: 50% (100g) of the original ingredients (because we've just removed half)
By day 4, there's 12.5% (25g) of the original ingredients, and by day 7 that's down to 1.5% (3g).
After 2 weeks, there's just 0.01% (0.02g) of the original flour and water left.
After a month, the amount of original starter remaining is virtually imperceptible and is smaller than a single particle of dust.
Along with feeding your starter, you'll get used to how it looks and smells. You'll know when it's healthy and active, or when it smells or looks hungry. You can get away with forgetting to feed your starter every so often (mine is kept on the worktop and you can bet your life it gets neglected once a week). It'll be fine – just feed it as normal the next time it's due.
I've never known a starter to have mould in it, but it does happen occasionally. I've also seen from others' posts online that mould can occasionally present as pink streaks. If you spot mould or pink in your starter, simply discard your whole starter and begin again from scratch. Don't get overly worried about this though - keep your starter fed and keep its container clean, and you shouldn't be troubled by mould.
How to Make a Sourdough Starter From Scratch
What You Need To Make a Sourdough Starter
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A container
When I'm starting a new starter, I find it easier to use a fairly open container to let the air in. A cereal bowl (or even a large mug) will do. Cover it with something like a clean tea towel/beeswax wrap/fairly loose foil. You want to prevent things from falling into your new starter, but you want to allow some contact with the air to let the wild yeasts in.
While your new starter is left semi-open to the air, you may find a skin forms on the surface. Don't worry. You can remove it if you wish, but I'd recommend simply stirring it in when you next feed your starter - after all, the wild yeast spores you're trying to encourage will be lying on the surface so you'll get quicker results.
For my permanent container, I use a lidded Kilner jar* with the sealing ring removed so the gases can escape (and preventing my sealed jar from exploding...).
Flour
I recommend regular strong white bread flour. Some people swear by wholemeal bread flour, or rye flour, etc., and they're probably all fine too. Some think that a starter is happiest when it's used to bake with the same type of flour as it's made with so, for example, if you do a lot of baking with rye, you may like to have a rye-based starter. I simply use strong white bread flour because it seems to be the most versatile and an all-rounder.
It's not the end of the world if you need to use a different flour in your starter every now and then. Even a simple plain flour (all-purpose flour for our readers across the pond) will do in a pinch.
Water
Regular, cold water is fine. The only point worth adding is that I've found chlorinated water to be very difficult to work with because the chlorine kills your wild yeasts off! If your tap water is chlorinated (or if you're not sure and you find that your starter isn't getting going easily), then I'd highly recommend using a water filter like the Brita ones. Your houseplants and gut biome will love you for it too!
Making Your Starter: A Day-by-Day Guide
Feed your starter at roughly a similar time each day, though it really doesn't have to be exact. I do mine while my porridge heats up in the mornings just because it's what fits in. You could do it whenever it works for you, but try to keep the feedings roughly 24 hours apart if you can. 2-3 hours either side won't hurt.
You'll notice that the water is weighed - why? Simply because we have the scales out already to weigh the flour so it makes sense – much easier than trying to measure in two different ways.
Each time you feed, you can either mix your ingredients and then place the mixture into a clean container, or you can mix in the container and scrape the sides down inside (with a spoon or dough scraper) to leave them clean.
Day 1: Mix together 50g flour and 50g water. Loosely cover, allowing air flow (see above). Leave on the kitchen worktop.
Day 2: You may see a few bubbles, you may not. Don't worry, either is fine. Mix 30g flour and 30g water together with all of Day 1's starter. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Day 3: Again, you'll possibly see a few bubbles. You may notice the smell changing a little too. Mix 30g flour and 30g water together with all of Day 2's starter. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Day 4: The smell of your starter may change again, possibly to something slightly vinegary. It might also look pretty active (or not, which is okay too). It's not strong enough to use yet but it's a nice sign if you can see some activity. You need to remove roughly half of the starter today to make room for adding new flour and water. You can either do this by eye, or by weight but it doesn't need to be exact. Mix the remaining half with 30g flour and 30g water. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Day 5: Your starter may look less active today but don't worry, it's just quietly strengthening itself. Mix 30g flour and 30g water together with all of Day 4's starter. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Day 6: You need to remove roughly half of the starter again today to make room for adding new flour and water. You can either do this by eye, or by weight but it doesn't need to be exact. Mix the remaining half with 30g flour and 30g water. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Day 7: Fingers crossed, you'll be seeing bubbles by now! Mix 30g flour and 30g water together with all of Day 6's starter. Loosely cover. Leave on worktop.
Now's the time to start looking for signs that your starter is established enough to bake with. Some will be, some will need longer.
Signs Your Starter Is Ready for Baking
- It roughly doubles in size by several hours after feeding
- You can see small bubbles all the way through the starter
- Around its feeding time it has a generally smooth and even texture, rather like thick emulsion paint
If you don't see those signs in your starter yet, don’t worry. Your wild yeast community is still developing and simply needs a bit more time. Some starters may take a couple more days, some might need a couple of weeks.
My daughter was going to throw her starter away when there was no sign of life after 8 days. On a whim, she kept it, carried on feeding it, and it suddenly sprang to life a few days afterwards. Years later, it's still going strong! Hang on in there! Simply keep on feeding it daily with equal parts flour and water (30g each), discarding half every other day before feeding. Watch for signs of readiness.
Once your starter is ready, you can move on from starting your starter to maintaining your starter.
How To Maintain a Sourdough Starter (Forever!)
From now on, you don't need to leave your starter open to the air, so pop on a lid which will still allow the gases to escape. If you're using a Kilner-type jar*, remove the sealing ring and then just close the lid as usual.
Once your starter is strong enough, you can choose to either continue keeping it out on the worktop, or you can move it to the fridge when it's not needed.
Keeping your starter on the worktop – for the frequent bakers
- Keeps your starter in an active state
- Best if you’re baking at least every other day
- Will need daily feeding and discarding
Keeping your starter in the fridge – for the weekend (or occasional) bakers
- Keeps your starter in an inactive state (think of it as being asleep)
- Won't need to be fed whilst it's being kept in the fridge
- Will need to be brought back to being active before baking. You can do this by removing it from the fridge 24 hours before you wish to start a new bake.
How To Feed Your Starter
50g flour
50g water
100g starter
Combine 50g flour, 50g water and 100g starter into a bowl and stir together. Discard any remaining existing starter. Pour the new mixture into your starter jar.
If you find that you don’t have the full 100g of starter to add, it really doesn’t matter – just add the amount that you have. Sourdough is incredibly resilient. Even a small amount of starter can bounce back to full strength when fed.
Some bakers use every last bit of their starter in their bake, leaving just the scrapes in the jar for the next feed. It still works! The trade-off is that it will take a bit longer for your mixture to reach full strength, since you're starting with much less of the established culture each time. Think of it like having fewer helpers to get the job done - they'll still finish, just at a more leisurely pace.
How about if you need to discard some of your starter but you're not planning to bake a loaf? Well, don't be tempted to just pour it straight from your jar and down the sink - it sets like concrete in your pipes! You can use it in so many recipes. In discard recipes, it's sometimes used for flavour, like adding its wonderful tang to pancakes. It can also be used to give a boost to Chelsea buns. A quick Google search will bring up so many possibilities.
Making Sourdough Simple
Sourdough baking often sounds difficult and confusing when you're just starting to find out about it. Many books, or Google searches, use unfamiliar words, or speak in percentages, or will convince you that you must only ever use water at an exact temperature to feed your starter. Fear not - we're going to sweep all that to one side and take things back to the simple ways. After all, I don't think my grandmother would have known what an autolyse was, and we don't really need to know either.
I don't doubt that the complicated ways work, and I'm sure the bakers are highly skilled and have great results, but it's not my way. Equally, I can't follow a recipe that insists that I need to do things to an exact timescale. Now that I've got to know sourdough, I assure you that it can fit into your life rather than you fitting your life around it. It's such a forgiving method in so many ways - the only thing it needs is some reasonably consistent care, and time to do its work.
Understanding Sourdough's Natural Rhythm
Sourdough baking follows a gentle, relaxed cycle that fits naturally around your daily routine. Let's break down the basic timings:
• Morning: Feed your starter
• Evening: Mix your dough
• Next morning: Shape and refrigerate
• If you're at home, bake mid-morning for a fresh lunchtime loaf
• If you're working 9-5, return home to a dough that's ready to bake. By keeping the dough in the fridge all day, it slows the fermentation so you can simply pop it in the oven when you're ready.
Dough is generally fine being kept up to about 12 hours in the fridge before baking. It will happily keep for longer (I've kept it around 24 hours before) but it will lose its strength and you'll have a wider, flatter, less-risen loaf. The flavour can also be a little stronger, but it's still wonderful to dunk in your soup.
Tips To Make Feeding Your Starter Super Quick and Simple
Once you've found your rhythm and routine, sourdough needs surprisingly little time and energy to regularly churn out very impressive-looking loaves! Here are a few tips to help reduce it even further:
• Keep everything you need to hand. Keep it clean and ready to use, gathered together in a corner or cupboard so you don't have to go searching every time.
• Have two starter jars so you can simply transfer your newly-fed starter into a clean jar each morning and pop the used one into the washing-up bowl to soak.
• Find suitably sized scoops and measures so you can simply know you need one scoop of flour, one measure of water, etc., when you're feeding your starter.
So, that's the first stage of your sourdough journey completed! Hopefully you'll now have a lively and bubbly starter which is ready to bake with. Take a moment to pause - you've just created life from flour and water! When you're ready to turn your starter into amazing bread, come and read Sourdough Part 2: Baking Bread.
Do you have questions? Want to share pics of your starter, or do you have your own tips to share with others? Pop them in the comments section below.
Happy baking!
Please be aware: All text and pictures (unless otherwise specified) © Woodlarking
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