Starting a Starter
Jul 20th, 2008 by SteveB
While bread leavened with baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) is an integral part of any baker’s repertoire, that repertoire would be incomplete without the complex flavors that can only come from naturally leavened bread. Known as sourdough bread here in the U.S., this type of bread relies on the wild yeast and bacteria naturally present on the grain to provide both leavening and a unique, mildly acidic flavor profile. However, before they can be used in the production of bread, these wild yeast and bacteria first need to be activated and cultured. This is the process of creating a sourdough starter.
Producing a sourdough starter can be a bit tricky if one is not familiar with the way a healthy starter looks and behaves. For this reason, I strongly recommend that a baker’s first experience with sourdough be with a well established starter. Ways in which to obtain such a starter include:
- Asking a friend or local bakery,
- Getting some dried starter, gratis, from Carl Griffth’s sourdough page or
- Purchasing one from King Arthur Flour.
For those who are a bit more adventurous and wish to create their own starter, I’ve detailed the method I use below. There are many different ways to create a starter; there is no one ‘correct’ way. As with many aspects of baking, the best counsel is to use what works best for you.
Day 1
- 50 g Organic medium whole rye flour
- 50 g Unbleached all-purpose flour
- 100 g Water
Mix together the rye flour, unbleached all-purpose flour and water until combined. Organic whole rye provides an excellent source of the yeast and bacteria we wish to culture. If desired, organic whole wheat flour can be used in place of the rye flour. Although tap water will probably be fine if it isn’t too heavily treated, I prefer using spring water. The mixture will resemble lumpy oatmeal:
Let the mixture sit for 24 hours at approximately 80°F. After the first 24 hours, the mixture may have risen considerably. Don’t congratulate yourself just yet! In all probability, you’ve managed to culture Leuconostoc bacteria which, while not generally harmful, is not a genus of bacteria you are looking to propagate. To get an indication if Leuconostoc is present, carefully smell the culture. A putrid smell is a hallmark of the Leucostonoc genus. Fear not! Leuconostoc bacteria will eventually die off under acidic conditions and as the culture develops, it will become more and more acidic.
Day 2
- 100 g Culture
- 25 g Organic medium whole rye flour
- 25 g Unbleached all-purpose flour
- 50 g Water
Discard half of the culture from Day 1 and to the remaining 100 g of culture mix in the rye flour, all-purpose flour and water. This mixture is once again allowed to sit at approximately 80°F for another 24 hours. After this time, the culture has shown signs of rising, then falling:
Days 3-5
Continue with the feeding regimen shown for Day 2 every 24 hours. As the desired yeast and bacteria begin to populate the culture, the culture will drop in pH (become more acidic) and the leuconostoc bacteria will die off. In some cases, it may take longer than 5 days for this to happen. The culture will no longer rise and it may appear as if nothing is happening within the culture. Be patient. Just keep on the previous feeding regimen until you once again begin to see small bubbles forming within the culture.
Day 6
- 100 g Culture
- 50 g Unbleached all-purpose flour
- 50 g Water
At this point, enough yeast and bacteria have been activated so that rye flour is no longer needed. Mix the culture, all-purpose flour and water and again let sit at approximately 80°F. Continue this regimen but shorten the time between feedings to every 12 hours. After a few more of these 12 hour feedings, you should have a very active, bubbly and pleasantly yeasty-smelling sourdough starter.
Because a sourdough starter is a living thing, it needs to be continually fed on a regular basis or it will die. Some choose to refrigerate their starter in between feedings as a way of extending the time between feedings. I prefer to simply feed my starter on a twice daily basis. Since I prefer a firm starter (50% hydration), I feed my starter every 12 hours using the following formula:
- 25 g Starter
- 50 g Unbleached all-purpose flour
- 25 g Water
The starter is kept at around 72°F in between feedings. Using this protocol, I am able to keep a relatively small amount of starter on hand and only build up the quantity of starter needed when I wish to bake bread. This keeps the amount of discarded flour to a minimum.
I’ve just baked my first (successful) sourdough…plenty of attempts over the years have been basically disastrous. If you get the starter right, you can’t fail.
I used a recipe from the Moro cookbook by Sam and Sam Clark which involved fermenting a bunch of organic red grapes for the best part of a month. It worked extremely well, producing a vigorous and active starter. But the effort, the effort….feeding twice a day, general angst and worry, complaints from the family about ‘weird smelling slurry’…
My creation is now laying dormant at the back of the fridge, but will be re-awakened for a couple of loaves next weekend.
i am in the process of starting my own starters from scratch as well. i have 3 of them going…..in case one fails. i’m using the maggie glezer starter, peter reinhart and la brea bakery starter (which uses fermented grapes). i like the idea of reinharts to include pinapple juice to deal w/ the problem of the leuostactic bacteria. the la brea bakery w/ the grapes has been very responsive since the beginning. the glezer is doing well now too. i’m really looking forward to getting to the point of being able to bake bread w/ them. probably about one week away! i’m enjoying your blog and your pictures are wonderful and bread shapes so artistic!
Deborah, I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog. When it comes to starting a starter, I’m all for simplicity; organic flour, water and the most important ingredient of all, patience. Everything you need is already on the grain! If you can stand the smell for a short time, leuconostoc bacteria, should they be present, are not really a problem since they cannot survive the developing lower pH of the starter.
them apples, I’m assuming your family doesn’t have any pets. Maintaining a starter is far easier and much less worrisome than taking care of the family hamster, cat or dog!
Hi Steve,
I think I gained enough courage to try the sourdough starter. It sounds a bit intimidating but fun at the same time… I have a few questions I hope you can answer for me.
1. I don’t have organic flours. I only have KAF AP, and KAF medium rye. Will these work?
2. The current temperature here is 75degrees, will that affect my starter very much?
3. I am unclear on Day 6 and onward. Do you discard everything except 100g of the culture on day 6? From Day 7 onward you mention 25grams of starter, 50g of AP and 25g water . Does this mean you throw out all but 25grams of the starter before adding the AP and water? After waiting 12 hours you repeat, throwing all but 25 grams of starter away again before adding the flour and water?
4. If I chose to refrigerate after day 7 to lower the number of feedings, how long can I refrigerate before feeding again? I don’t want to kill it by letting it sit too long in the fridge. However, I don’t think I will have time in the next few months to make sourdough more than twice a month.
I can’t wait to try my hand at sourdough! I made your baguettes around 4 months ago and they were FABULOUS! The first time EVER that I made an edible baguette ~ all thanks to you and your great videos.
I was getting ready to try some of your other breads but my father passed away a few weeks later and I couldn’t get myself to get back into the kitchen to bake. Bread baking was a passion my father and I shared and it was just too hard knowing I wasn’t going to be able to e-mail him pictures of my latest creation. I think I am ready again….
Thanks for the hard work you put into your site, I visit it often to drool! Your videos ~ lifesaver~ and so informative. I hope you continue to post for beginners like me.
Kind Regards,
Jules
Hi Jules,
Before I get to your questions, I’d like to first offer my condolences on the loss of your father.
1 – I’ve specified organic flour because this indicates that no pesticides or other chemicals were used in the cultivation of the grain. These chemicals can adversely affect the microorganisms, present on the surface of the grain, that you are looking to culture. Not having organic all-purpose flour isn’t too big of an issue but, at a minimum, I would try to make sure that your rye flour is organic.
2 – A temperature of 75ºF should be fine.
3 – You are correct. Whenever a specified quantity of starter is used for a feeding, the remainder of the starter can be discarded.
4 – If you refrigerate your starter once it is fully active, my recommendation would be to feed it at least once a week, whether you use it to bake bread or not. Others have reported refrigerating their starters for much longer periods of time before feedings, but I wouldn’t recommend it.
Thanks for all your kind words and good luck!
Thank you Steve for the condolences. I am still not back to my old self (maybe will never be) but I am trying to get back to my normal routine as much as possible. Practicing this wonderful, edible art form, I hope can be theraputic. Maybe I will take out some of my agression towards my dads doctors while kneading my dough. A few extra slap arounds shouldn’t hurt the final bread too much….
I will start my starter tonight and let you know, if I am not put to shame, how it works out.
I am on ebay looking for a chafer dish insert (or rig an aluminum roaster) to create a steam oven like you did. Another ingenious idea!
Thanks again for your creativity and willingness to share your expertise
Hello SteveB
I enjoy yours blog .Beautyful and tasty bread.I has made a starter on yours the recipe and has baked bread Pain de levain- very tasty bread. I am happy with result.
Now I have two questions 1—my starter became much more dense (I keep it an 100%hydration) –Dos it is normally?
2- how many time should the starter has risen after feeding and through how many hours it ready to beke?
Or all to do under the old scheme – 12 hours?.
alla, it’s nice to hear that you’ve been able to bake a tasty pain au levain using the starter instructions and recipe posted here.
Answering your questions in order:
1) Your starter should become less dense (greater volume) as the 12 hour feeding cycle progresses due to the formation of bubbles in the starter. If your starter has become more dense at the end of your feeding cycle, it might mean that your starter has fermented too much, used up all its nutrients and has collapsed upon itself. You can check this by looking for a starter residue line up on the inside of your starter container. If this is the case, you may need to lower the temperature a bit to get a 12 hour feed cycle.
2) I like to go through at least two, 12-hour feeding cycles before using the starter to bake bread. Remember, the starter should always be fed and used to bake bread right at the point where it is at maximum volume, right before it collapses.
There are many other feeding cycles that people use but what I’ve described above is a good place to start.
[...] Art des Sauerteigs weiterzuführen, begonnen, ihn alle 12 Stunden zu füttern, wie es hier und hier erklärt wird. Dabei habe ich 25g Mehl, 25g Sauerteig und 25g Wasser [...]
Wow! The amazing pictures of bread on your site really make me want to start a starter! Your explanations are the best I have seen yet, with very helpful pictures. I hope you can answer some of my questions before I proceed:
1. Is there a particular reason you prefer a firmer starter with only 50% hydration? does it change the taste?
2. Is there a particular reason you shorten the feeding time to 12 hours after day 6? Some other sites recommend just feeding the starter daily, but since I haven’t tried their “recipe” I have no way of knowing if this changes anything.
3. I have organic rye, organic wholewheat and organic all-purpose. Does using rye increase the acidity (as opposed to wholewheat for instance)? If I am looking for a complex but subtle flavor and not a blatantly sour one, what should I choose (or does it not make a difference)?
4. I have read that it takes DECADES (!!!!!) for the starter to achieve the desired flavour and that the first few breads baked with the starter are virtually unedible. Is that true from your experience? How old is your starter?
5. Can I scale down your recipe to half? Or is that the smallest you can get to properly culture the little critters?
6. You put equal parts in MASS of flour and water, whereas all the other sites I have seen put equal parts in VOLUME. Does it make a big difference (I do not own a kitchen scale)? 100g of water are a 100ml, easy enough, but do you know how many cups 50g of rye and flour are? (or where I could find out)
7. I will be moving to another apartment in September this year. Should I wait til then to start a starter or can I move it along with me (albeit veeeryyy carefully)? Do you know if strange things will happen to it?
8. Finally, I only plan on baking about once a week. Although I do plan on placing my starter in the fridge (thinking it would be more economical than keeping it out), do you think it is worth getting into all the trouble of making a starter if I only bake once a week?
I am sorry for such a long series of questions. Thanks for your instructions!
Aisha, it seems as if you have certainly been bitten by the sourdough bug!
I’ll try to answer your questions in turn:
1 – When first establishing a sourdough culture, I recommend working at a 100% hydration for the simple reason that the chemical and biological processes in your starter will occur at a faster rate than at 50% hydration. Once your culture is established, it can be maintained at any hydration you desire. The hydration of your starter can have an effect on the specific microbial populations present within the starter, but other parameters (e.g., the amount of starter mixed into your bread dough, the length of time elapsed during the first fermentation, the temperature at which the fermentation takes place, etc.) can be manipulated to result in a bread with the desired flavor.
2 – The feeding regimen is changed to every 12 hours at Day 6 because by this time, enough yeast and bacteria should be populating the culture such that all the food (i.e. flour) would be consumed by then. After the starter has become well established, the time between feedings will be determined by the ratio of starter to flour and water you decide to use.
3 – The flavor of your bread is not necessarily determined by the flavor of your starter (see answer to question 1). Besides, by the time your starter is ready to be used to make bread, all of the initial whole grain flour you used to start your culture will be diluted out by repeated feedings with white flour and you will have, for all intents and purposes, a white sourdough starter.
4 – Totally false.
5 – You should be able to scale it down.
6 – When beginning a starter, it doesn’t make a big difference whether you measure your ingredients in units of weight or volume. When baking bread, it makes a huge difference, so I would suggest investing in an inexpensive kitchen scale.
7 – Go for it!
8 – I only bake once a week myself. Only you can decide if it is worth the effort.
Excellent! Thank you so much for such a quick and precise response. I’m off to buy a kitchen scale tomorrow, and will be all set to prepare my starter. I discovered your site barely 4 days ago and am really impressed by your bread-making skills, your clear explanations and videos. I especially like the “experimental protocol” writing style (intentional?). It appeals to the biologist/medic in me. You make preparing a starter sound as easy as culturing E. coli in Luria broth!
Now if I could only get the “broth” right on my first attempt… Thanks again!
Aisha, I’m glad I can be of some help. I’m afraid my writing style is a result, in part, of my years of training as an organic chemist.
Hi Steve – I have a starter troubleshooting question. I have a healthy 100% hydration wild yeast starter I began with the Reinhart method. I followed Maggie Glezers instructions for converting it to a firm (50%) starter. My firm starter attempts seem weak, however. When I refresh, I dissolve the fermented starter in the water and knead together with the flour to form a stiff dough. It seems almost too stiff – it takes lots of pressure from both thumbs to knead and persistence to incorporate all the flour. I put 85 grams of starter in a one cup measuring cup in a 70 degree place, and it will take 24 hours or more to fill the cup, and 36 hours or more to rise then collapse. I understand a good benchmark for an 85 gram starter is to achieve one cup of volume in 8 to 12 hours. Even after two weeks of refreshments, the time to rise hasn’t approached that benchmark.
I wait to refresh until the 85 gram starter fills a one cup measuring cup. I am weighing ingredients and using a thermometer. I have had good success with 100% hydration wild yeast starter, and pre ferments with packaged yeast. It is only the firm starter that seems to evade me. Do you have any suggestions? Is the volume benchmark I am using (1 cup for 85 grams of starter) an appropriate one?
I appreciate your time and really enjoy your site – it is obviously a labor of love and very nicely done.
Bruce G
Hi Bruce,
I just did some quick calculations and it appears as if Glezer’s quantities for converting a 100% hydration (liquid) starter into a 50% hydration (firm) starter are in error. One would need to add 40 g of 100% hydration starter to 15 g of water and 50 g of flour, producing 105 g of the 50% hydration starter. Try these quantites and see if it works.
Hey great web site!
I started the starter about a week and a half ago and followed your instructions step by step accurately. There is one question I have. Why does it smell so strong like alcohol? It is supposed go away soon or what. Please help me!
P.S. It rises very well about triple in size.
anom, I’m glad you’re enjoying the site. A slight aroma of alcohol in your starter is normal, as alcohol is one of the metabolic by-products of yeast. If the alcohol aroma is overpowering, it may be an indication that you need to feed your starter more often.
[...] that is an adventure in and of itself, but is well documented on many sites, such as here, here, or here. The specifics may differ, but the idea is always the same: you need to create a water/flour [...]
Για σου στηβ η μιζα μου ειναι πολυ καλη και μπορω να κανω καλα ψωμια. Αυτο που δεν εχω καταλαβη ειναι ποση μιζα πρεπει να εχω για 10 κιλα αλευρι για τελικη ζυμη . ευχαριστω
anastasios, I am sorry but unfortunately I do not speak Greek. If you have a question and are able to ask it in English, I will try to answer you.
[...] Bread Cetera: Starting a Starter [...]
Hello again Steve,
When I start the starter, I am assuming that the container I use to grow the culture should be covered with the container’s lid, or should I use loose plastic?
Also, if my place is not warm enough, can I put the container inside the oven or should it remain on the counter (and maybe wrap a hot towel around the container). Sorry for my stupid questions (but as my former boss said, “there is no such thing as a stupid question.”
Thank you, Steve. Great site! So simple, no clutter. The layout of your site keeps me focused. I like the absence of visual traffic.
sharon, as long as your container is loosely covered, it really doesn’t matter what you use to cover it.
To provide a warm environment for a starter, some people use their oven (turned off, of course) with the internal light kept on. The incandescent bulb should provide just enough heat to keep the starter warm.
I need a 50% hydration starter. Do I first make the 100% hydration starter? Help needed
karin, some people create their starter at 50% hydration from the outset, but I prefer to create mine at 100% hydration then, once it is active, convert it to 50% hydration.
thanks Steve!
Steve,
I’ve been baking for a while and cannot get my sourdough to the same light and airy level I get with my straight dough breads. The sourdough breads always bake to a much more dense bread. Any ideas?
Bob,
Among other things, a key to producing a light and airy crumb in a sourdough loaf is to make sure that your sourdough starter is at the peak of its health and vitality. I maintain the activity of my starter by keeping it at room temperature and feeding it twice a day. It has never seen the inside of a refrigerator.
Other things to consider include making sure the dough is mixed with a sufficient amount of water and being very gentle in handling the dough.
Thanks Steve. I’ve been using Peter Reinhart’s sourdough formula, feeding once a day. I recently increased the feeding to twice a day and have been monitoring the status of the starter before mixing the pre-ferment. Much better results, you are absolutely right. Much better crumb.
By the way, I made croissants for the first time this weekend, a real hit with the family. I followed your strategy and made half croissants and half pain au chocolat. Thanks for the videos, they were a tremendous help.
Hi Steve, can an active starter be substituted for the poolish called for in some of your recipes?
Keith, an active starter can certainly be used instead of a poolish in some recipes. If you plan to use a 100% hydration starter, then you can use the same amount of starter as the amount of poolish called for by the recipe. If your starter is anything other than 100% hydration, then you would need to calculate how much starter you would need to add in order to obtain the same amount of pre-fermented flour as in the poolish. Please note that using starter instead of poolish can change process timing considerably and will probably yield a product with its own unique flavor.
Hi Steve,
I follow your recipe for the starter, the first 5 days it rise OK. But after I start feeding the starter every 12 hrs, I didn’t see it change much. It only rise a little bit and with some bubbles, not a lot like yours. Did I do something wrong? Should I go back to feed it every 24 hrs to give it more time to grow?
Thanks.
Hi Kim,
The 12 hour feeding interval works well when the starter is being kept at around 72ºF. If your temperature is lower than that, you may need to extend the feeding interval. If you have your starter at around 72ºF, then try adding a small amount of whole rye flour to your next few feedings, while making sure that you aerate the mixture with a whisk when you combine the starter with the flour and water. I find that aerating the mixture can sometimes help to reinvigorate a sluggish starter.
Thanks Steve. I will try adding a little whole rye flour to the feeding tonight and will use the whisk to aerate the mixture. Will let you know how it comes out. I have a couple of questions:
1. My house is too cold so I keep the starter in the oven with the light on, and the temp is at 90ºF + …….. is it too hot for the starter? But if I turn it off, then the temp is only at 60ºF. I don’t know where to keep the starter at the constant of 72ºF.
2. If I keep the starter in the frig between feeding, do I have to let the starter comes to room temp before the next feeding?
By the way, I love your website…. beautiful breads.
Kim, thank you for your compliments regarding the website.
1) Temperatures in excess of 90ºF are really too hot to properly maintain a sourdough starter. I would strongly recommend that you find a way to keep your starter somewhere in the 70-80ºF range. Perhaps an insulated cooler containing a jar of warm water might do the trick.
2) Do not attempt to store your newly created starter in the refrigerator until it becomes fully active and shows that it can maintain its activity through a number of days of repeated feeding cycles. If you then decide to store your starter under refrigeration, it should be allowed to reach room temperature before feeding.
Hi. I just wanted to thank you so much for this page. I’m a college student and I’ve just started baking my own bread (first loaves I ever made came out of the oven 5 days ago) as a method to keep my stress level down because I’m working on my thesis. I started my first ever sourdough starter about 48 hours ago and thanks to the detailed process on this page it’s actually growing! Thanks again.
Hi Sulpicia,
I’m glad to hear that your newly created sourdough starter is beginning to thrive.
I have first-hand knowledge of the stresses that can develop when one is working on his/her thesis. In my not-so-impartial opinion, creating a sourdough starter and using it to bake bread is an ideal way to help cope with those stresses.
Hi, Steve
First of all thank you for the great site. The article on kneading or mixing helped me to get finally some edible bread in stead of heavy slices of cooked dough.
One thing that is not entirely clear to me is whether you clean or change the vessel when removing and feeding the starter?
Sincerely,
Erwin
Hi Erwin,
I’m glad you’re enjoying your visits to Bread cetera.
Whenever I feed my starter, I always clean the jar that I keep it in prior to placing the newly fed starter back in. But that’s just me. I tend to be obsessive about such things. Some people clean their starter jars only when mold or other unwanted growth becomes apparent, presumably without any deleterious effects.
I saw an exchange you had with a commenter concerning a problem that I also have with my dough, and now I can’t find where it was… Could you repeat what should be tried (I think it was in regards to the starter?) to my high-hydration dough which often comes out “wobbly” and spreads out/unable to hold shape? I’ve gotten pretty good at handling/folding the 76%, but from what I’ve seen on videos my end bulk-ferment dough is too soft to shape as others do. I can usually manage to get some ovenspring and ears when it retards in a terra cotta pot, but scoring pulls the dough (distorting the thin skin formed by resting in cloth), rather than cutting through as I’ve see demonstrated. Thanks, I love this site and your bread really rocks – I hope to be 1/2 the baker you are! (PS I recently made a loaf with a bit of apple cider in it, and the dough firmed right up – coincidence or clue?)
BreadHead,
If your high-hydration dough appears to be overly fluid and spreads out more than just a little bit after shaping, chances are the gluten hasn’t been sufficiently developed during mixing. For mixing high-hydration doughs, I would recommend using the double hydration technique. A description of the technique can be found here. If, after mixing using the technique, the dough is still too fluid, one or two folds during the fermentation period should further strengthen the dough.
Steve,
I converted your metric measurements to cups and teaspoons, but I’m afraid I made a mistake in the conversions. Here’s what I came up with:
680 g (3 cups) King Arthur All-Purpose Flour
90 g (1/2 cup) Medium Rye Flour
455 g (2 cups) Water
15 g (3 tsp) Salt
300 g (1 1/3 cups) Levain (mature sourdough culture, 100% hydration)
After the mixture had set for 30 minutes, it was still very liquid and sticky. I could have poured it out of the bowl, but certainly couldn’t have worked it by hand. I added more flour to get it to a texture that would allow me to work with it. It’s fermenting now. Are my conversions nearly correct? Should I have incorporated water a little at t time?
Geoff,
There really is no way to accurately convert volume measurements to those based upon weight. My suggestion would be to invest in an inexpensive kitchen scale and use weight-based measurements. You’ll find that the use of weight-based measurements will dramatically improve the consistency of your baking.
Hear, Hear! I bought a rather inexpensive variety ($10.00) and though far from perfect, it has improved my conception of finishing dough so that I can concentrate on some of my challenges with the final rise (bit impatient with the whole wheat, learning new shapes, getting good surface tension, etc) and the bake (hot/cool pan? steam/none?).
I must echo the comments congratulating you on the composition of the site. I too find myself venturing forth with the Reinhart method, though I had to quit my last effort — presumably it was too cool. I want to try (Poilâne) miche as soon as possible.
I last made sourdough with the method mentioned by Mark Bittman. He uses a dash of active dry yeast or instant yeast and he sets it out (lightly covered) for 72 hours with stirring. Leaving aside the fact that at that time I did not truly know anything about building the loaves, I did have limited success with the formula. My real issue with that was that I did not know what was going on in the starter. This starter was not wild yeast was it?
Frank,
I’ve found that the addition of baker’s yeast is not necessary to begin a sourdough starter. Water and whole grain flour is all that is needed. That being said, I will not go so far as to say that a starter begun with a bit of baker’s yeast, if repeatedly refreshed over a long enough period of time, is not a ‘real’ sourdough starter. After a sufficient period of time, the starter will become acidic enough so that the baker’s yeast will die off and be replaced by the acid-tolerant wild yeast present on the grain. I would hesitate to say, though, that 72 hours is a sufficient period of time for this to happen.
The recipe is in How to Cook Everything in the bread section. I had some decent results, but I am sure that this wild formula will net a better starter. I think as I become more used to producing bread that resembles my goals when I set out, I expect flavor, crumb, and some of the more nuanced features of bread that the former lacks.
Hi SteveB,
Thanks for this guide. I am now the proud papa of millions of micro-organisms. I used the rye, but past experience informs me to use as much practically whole grain as possible, so I put in some durum-atta flour (nearly whole durum flour) for the entire first few days (interesting character, and I may use that alternately with the AP for feedings).
No leuconostoc to report this time around, though I had it when I mixed AP flour with rye in my first attempt (using just the Peter Reinhart formula–using OJ as well in that). I especially appreciate your guidance about keeping chlorinated water away from the culture. Close second to that was the use of few ingredients. Just a couple of heaping tablespoons each pass: Great economy.
What wasn’t economical: keeping the formula in the oven, wrapped in a cloth to hinder the greenhouse-effect, while the oven light was on. But I won’t need that for the duration anyway. This kept the culture at 29 C.
Again: Thanks!
Steve,
Fabulous site. I have been making sourdough bread for a couple years now and have used your process to make up some starter.
My bread comes out looking great with a nice crust and great crumb. But my bread is never very sour tasting. Sometimes there is a hint of sour and most often not even that.
Can you suggest a method of consistently getting sourdough bread to taste sour and at the same time be able to control the level of sourness?
Your help will be greatly appreciated.
Moniker
Moniker,
As you probably know from reading my post on Pain au Levain, I don’t consider sourness to be a desirable attribute in naturally leavened bread. Be that as it may, the factors affecting sourness are numerous and their interactions are fairly complex. I would encourage you to read an excellent post on the topic by Debra Wink seen here. A bit further down in the thread, Debra lists some specific factors to consider when one is looking to modify the acidic profile of a sourdough loaf.
Steve,
Thank you for the post.
Ms. Wink explained the processes very clearly. I was most surprized that the Sanfransisco bacillus is widely available and is mostly controlled by culture process rather than location.
As for sourness in bread, I feel that sourness has its place in artisan bread and I would like to produce it at will. Sour bread is great for some things and not reccomended for others.
Thank you for a great site.
Moniker
Hi Steve,
Thanks for your wonderfully informative introduction to the world of making a starter. I’m very keen to get stuck into this but I have a question about climate conditions. I live in the south of New Zealand, in a pretty chilly apartment, which never gets above 18 degrees Celsius. I guess that the average temperature would be around 10 degrees as we only heat the living room in the evening. It’s not much fun, but we survive. How do you think a starter would fare? We have gas-heated hot water too, so no chance of keeping it in the hot water cupboard unfortunately.
Thanks for your help.
Nico
Hi Nico,
I would not recommend attempting to culture a sourdough starter (or trying to maintain one, for that matter) at temperatures down around 10ºC. Instead, I would suggest you look into constructing a simple, inexpensive proof box. This would allow you to incubate your initial flour/water mixtures at 26ºC and, once active, maintain your starter within the desired 22-23ºC temperature range. The proof box, as its name implies, is also ideal for keeping your formed loaves warm during their final rise. Details of the proof box I’ve built and used can be found here.
Is it supposed to smell really bad? Im on my third day, its seeming to get more and more watery over the days… Am i doing this right? I followed the directions to the T..
Anthony,
For the first few days, the culture may have a disagreeable or even putrid smell. This is natural and caused by the growth of Leuconostoc bacteria. This bacteria will die out as the pH of the culture drops and the culture matures. Just keep up with the refreshment schedule as described. Within another few days, the disagreeable odor should disappear and be replaced by a fresh, yeasty smell.
[...] verveling of voedselvergiftiging (dat kan ook) het huis ondergekotst, mijn zorgvuldig opgekweekte zuurdesemstarter is een stille dood gestorven en mijn haar zit clichématig [...]
[...] in plaats van melk. De gist vervang ik, bij wijze van experiment, door mijn zorgvuldig opgekweekte zuurdesemstarter. Op [...]
Dear Steve,
I have only recently come across your website and I am very impressed. I live in the UK although originally from Hungary. We have very strong baking traditions over there, many bakeries still use the old fashioned traditional techniques, which I am/was missing here in the UK. I am chef so baking comes natural to me, in fact I enjoy more then anything.
I got sick of the mass-produced so called ”bread” you are obliged to buy in shops and supermarkets here, so I got more and more into bread making. Got to know many bakers through the help of the internet who share the same passion for REAL BREAD, which is fantastic.
I found that there are many bakers in the UK who are trying to change people’s conception on bread, to make them realize that sliced engineered, full of preservatives and additives bread in fact are not bread, they cause a lot of the gluten allergies that have sprung up in the last decade, and we need to get back to our traditional methods.
Here in the UK there is an campaign against mess-produced horror ”bread” called The Real Bread Campaign, lead by the lights of Andrew Whitely.
http://www.sustainweb.org/realbread/
Once again Steve, thank you very much for your hard work maintaining this site, I thoroughly enjoy using it. Keep up the good work.
Regards
Zoltan
Hi Zoltan,
Welcome to Bread cetera.
I am familiar with Andrew Whitley’s laudable Real Bread Campaign in the UK. In fact, I believe that Bread cetera is listed as a link on the Real Bread Campaign website. Thank you for bringing the campaign, and a link to its website, to the attention of the Bread cetera readership.
Hello Steve,
Am I being thick…?
If I want to maintain a 100% hydration starter, what is the right starter to flour and water ratio?
If this one produces a 50% hydration,
25 g Starter
50 g Unbleached all-purpose flour
25 g Water
do I just double up the water??
God, I feel like being back at school in my dreaded maths class…
Thank you for your help Steve.
Regards
Zoltan
Zoltan,
Your math teacher would be proud. You’ve got it right! Just double the amount of water to arrive at a suitable feeding ratio for a 100% hydration starter.
He always told me that maths would come handy one day and I was always doubting him… Lol
Thanks Steve
I haven’t seen what kind of flour you use. I am trying to find flour that is pesticide free. Any suggestions?
Vicki,
There are a number of flour companies that offer organic flour. King Arthur Flour, La Meunerie Milanaise and Heartland Mill are just three that immediately come to mind.
Hi Steve,
I have a healthy starter which I maintain with 1:2:3 feeding ratio once a week. I live in a place where summer temp. is as high as 40C.
1. Can you tell me; after feeding, when should I refrigerate it?
2. Many recipes call for a ripe starter. How do I judge when it is so?
Thanks and regards,
Anjali
Hi Anjali,
If you are feeding your starter at a 1:2:3 feeding ratio once a week at a temperature of 40ºC, your starter is most probably being underfed.
A starter can be judged as being mature or ripe when it has reached its maximum volume and has just begun to recede. A starter should be fed at or near its maturity. If, because of the high ambient temperature, you wish to refrigerate your starter, this should be done shortly after the starter has been fed.
Now the temp is around 33C and we have monsoon approaching. The humidity will be high. So can you suggest a maintenance regime to make a stiff starter?
“The starter should be fed near maturity.” Does it mean before the max volume recedes or after?
Thanks for your answer.
Anjali
Anjali,
For a stiff (60% hydration) starter at 25ºC, I would start out by feeding the starter at a ratio of 2:3:5 (starter:water:white flour) twice a day. If your temperature is higher or if you wish to feed less often, you can try either decreasing the ratio of starter or increasing the ratio of water and flour.
Try to optimize your feeding regimen so that you are feeding your starter at the point of maximum volume, just as the starter is beginning to recede.
Steve, I enjoy your site so much……….thanks for sharing such helpful info!
Happy Baking!
[...] bread cetera [...]
I am so impressed by this site–both the detail and loving care of your posts and the comments and interaction that follow each one.
I found you seeking a pain au levain recipe, which led me to this page. I haven’t had much luck with sourdough starter in the past but I have a feeling that’s my impatience working.
So, being impatient, I started the first day with unbleached flour and whole wheat flour because I didn’t have rye on hand. Day 2 same combo, at which point I also sprinkled in about 1/2 t. of commercial yeast, figuring I was already off the rails and I’ve read other starter recipes that used yeast. Day 3 (today) I finally picked up rye flour and started using it in place of the whole wheat.
Am I going to get somewhere with this or should I start over with rye from Day 1 and no commercial yeast?
This is exactly what I did when I started my starter. I’m glad to know that I’m not the only one. I’ve found methods using onion or grapes or raisin.
oh.. except I use unbleached bread flour for AP flour. Could you enlighten me on how to make Rye sour, please? My method is just to mix organic rye flour and water.
Thank you. Cheers
Hi Barb,
You put your finger right on it… the key to creating a vital sourdough starter is patience. Using a bit of commercial bakers yeast won’t harm the creation of a sourdough starter (the commercial yeast will eventually die out as it can’t tolerate the acidic conditions of the starter), but it also won’t be of that much benefit. Try continuing your regimen using rye flour but proceed based more on how the starter is behaving rather than the specific timetable given.
Hi Sian,
Regarding a rye sour, if you already have an active white flour sourdough starter, you can continue feeding it only rye flour and eventually that will transform your sourdough starter into a rye sour. If you wish to create a rye sour from scratch, you can use the method described above using only rye flour.
Thanks, Steve! I “solved” the problem by forgetting I had the starter stored in the oven; I turned it on to preheat to bake some pumpkin cinnamon rolls and voila! A chance to start over with half organic rye flour and half white….
[...] Starting a Starter at Breadcetera [...]
OK, new question–I finally have a nicely bubbly starter that’s on day 6 (or so–I think I may have lost track but it’s working so I’m not worrying).
I want to make your pain au levain, which calls for 300g levain.
To build up that volume do I skip the step of discarding starter and just keep increasing the volume of starter:water:flour? (at what ratio to build up?)
Does it need to have a day or more working at that volume before baking for optimal results?
Hi Barb,
You’ve got it! As long as you have an active starter, you can build up the amount of starter you need for a recipe by simply not discarding any during refreshments. Just keep the ratio of starter:flour:water the same during your refreshments to give you the same timing. No need to have multiple refreshments at the volume you require before using the starter.
Hello Steve,
I am probably one of many people around the world (who are trying sourdough-baking for the first time in their live. To my great surprise it works! The result was a lovely bread; it needed a bit more water in the dough but that is for next time. I’ve got one question about the starter; In your recipe at day 6 you mention to start feeding twice a day with 100 gr culture, 50 gr flour and 50 gr water. (that is what I have done) But when you write about feeding the starter you take 25 gr culture, 50 gr flour and 25 gr water. This gives a starter of 50% hydration; to make 100% hydration you double the water to 50gr. But that is a difference in use of culture of 75 gr. At what moment do you switch from using 100 gr culture to 25 gr culture?
Hi Carla,
Once your starter is very active and is growing in a reproducible manner through a number of feeding cycles, you can then scale the amount of starter you are feeding to whatever quantity you wish.
Hello Steve,
Thank you for answering my question. I think I must be a little more adventurous and not afraid to experiment. At the moment I’ve got 2 starters with different feeding quantities on my worktop. Both doing well. If I have understood it correctly than a 100% starter is always fed with a same amount in weight of flour and water, yes? So if I feed with 50 gr of flour I also put in 50 gr of water. If I’m wrong please tell me.
Why not add some vinegar to the initial starter? That should keep the Leuconostoc bacteria from growing in the first place. Reinhart uses pineapple juice to supply acidity, as I remember, but since acetic acid is one of the by products of the wild yeast/bacteria mixture in the sourdough culture anyway, why not start with some there in the beginning? A mature starter has a pH of about 3.5, so it wouldn’t take much vinegar, which is about 5% acetic acid and has a pH of about 2.4. Since the pH scale is logarithmic, a 10 or 20 fold dilution of the vinegar should be about right. That would be a teaspoon or two of vinegar as part of the 100g of water in the initial starter.
Hi DeWitt,
It turns out that vinegar is so highly inhibitory to yeast growth and activity in the doses required to lower the pH, it is not a suitable replacement for pineapple juice in Debra Wink’s starter creation protocol. For a full account by Ms. Wink on how the protocol was developed, see here and here.
SteveB,
Is it really the inhibition of growth by acetic acid or addition of sugars from the fruit juices stimulating growth? Even ascorbic acid can be metabolized. Acidity can also inhibit amylase and maltase activity. While fruit juice is a convenient source of acid and sugar, if that’s what’s really needed, I think I would rather use sugar and vinegar.
SteveB,
I looked up unsweetened pineapple juice. It’s 10% sugars by weight plus 2.9% additional unspecified carbohydrates. The breakdown of the sugars is
sucrose 15.2%
glucose 46.4%
fructose 38%
That’s a lot of yeast and bug food. I’m going to try 5% vinegar (5% acetic acid), 10% sucrose in water to the flour mixture instead of fruit juice.
The seed starter is rising rapidly slightly more than half way through day three. It’s light in color and smells OK. It’s just a one shot so there are no statistics, but the results are promising. I suspect people were using undiluted vinegar as the liquid phase. That definitely won’t work. The growth curve falls off a cliff starting about 100 mmolar acetic and stops dead at 166 mmolar. Vinegar is nearly 1 molar acetic acid. But there’s little effect below that concentration. I’ve been diluting the viinegar 1:20 so the acetic acid concentration is 41 mmolar. But I’m convinced that sugar is important as well. Fruit-Fresh® and sugar should work just as well and there’s already some dextrose in the Fruit-Fresh®.
And for my next trick, I’m going to try the sugar, vinegar and baking soda solution. I’m going to make an 80mmolar pH 4.5 acetate buffer of a 10% sugar solution. That should be enough to stop Leuconostoc growth but not so low as to stop LAB growth.
The acetate buffer (25 g vinegar, 25 g sugar, 1/8 tsp baking soda diluted to 250 g with water) worked as well or better than diluted vinegar and sugar alone. There was good activity after 72 hours and 24 hours later it doubles in volume in less than 3 hours after feeding. It’s light in color and smells like a typical starter. I’m using your suggested 10% rye, 20% whole wheat and 70% AP flour for feeding this time after the initial seeding with 50% rye and 50% AP flour..
Hi Steve,
I’ve had great success with the starter, but I have a few questions regarding its maintenance.
My starter is almost a month old and i’ve kept it at 100% hydration, in the fridge. I’m feeding it every three days, but i fear im over-feeding it. Should i increase my time in-between feeding’s to allow for a more developed culture?
Also, i know there is no ideal hydration level for sour-dough loaves, but is there a level you found that works best for you?
Cheers,
WJR
Hi Will,
Without actually seeing the condition of your starter three days after you’ve fed it, it’s difficult for me to say if it is being overfed. If you’re not seeing any significant increase in volume and/or the presence of fermentation bubbles, then I would say that you should increase the time in between feedings. If you’re seeing a water/alcohol layer (so called ‘hooch’) separating on top of the starter and are detecting a noticeable alcohol/acetone aroma, then you probably want to feed more often.
Because different hydration starters produce different dough characteristics and influence flavor differently, there is no one hydration level that works best. I’ve used starters at 50%, 100% and 125% hydration, depending upon the result I am looking to achieve.
Hi Steve,
Thanks for your reply.
Your description of the ‘hooch’ layer and an acetone smell is exactly what i’m getting. I’ll try feeding it more regularly, thankyou for your help.
Cheers,
WJR
Hello,
I just went to make bread with my sourdough starter for the first time, and it is moldy. Is this normal? Can I still use it?
Thanks,
Mariah
Hi Mariah,
Your sourdough starter should be free of mold. If the mold is localized, you should be able to remove it and, after multiple refreshments, your starter should be good to go. If there is mold throughout the starter, the starter should be discarded and a new one created.
Hi Steve, firstly i would like to say the your enthusiasm and dedication to helping folks in their quest for great bread is amazing. as you will no doubt ascertain from my following questions i am a tyro
to this culture.
I was given a starter from a baker friend who instructed me to feed in equal amounts of flour and water every four days whilst keeping in refrigerated ;the starter was very wet which i presume from his instructions was at 100% . I have followed his instructions and tried a recipe he provided me which said to take out the starter the night before using, and add with other flours and a preferment. I have used the starter for other recipes that have required a starter, using the same method by leaving out the night before using. from reading through the blog, i feel that this is not an active starter as there is no visible bubbling. Am i way of course here?
2. Can i use this starter in my fridge to create an active starter, if so, how?
3. I have seen some videos where a mother dough is used and this is re-hydrated with flour and water. How is this achieved?
4. Once you have your active starter (day six) do you continue to discard all but 25g every 24 hours? How would you go about building up your active starter so you have enough to bake many loaves?
many thanks for your patience Steve.
Hi Darren,
As you are a self-professed tyro when it comes to sourdough starters, I’m going to give you some advice that I give all bakers who are inexperienced in creating and working with starters: Forget about refrigeration for now. The most important thing for you to do right now is to get to know the characteristics of an active, vital starter. The only way to do this is to continually refresh your starter (in my case, I refresh twice a day) over a period of a couple of weeks to gain a full understanding of how your starter behaves at the hydration and temperature you choose to operate.
As an example, I currently maintain my starter at 125% hydration and 70-72°F (to get a feel for how your starter behaves, it is important that you find a way to maintain your starter at a constant temperature. For one solution to that challenge, see here). I feed my starter twice a day (7:00 AM and 7:00 PM), taking 30 g of the mature starter, whisking it with 125 g of water and then whisking in 100 g of flour. I then pour this loose, batter-like mixture into a loosely covered container and keep it 70-72°F. Under these inoculation, hydration and temperature conditions, I find that if my starter is fully active, it increases in volume and then starts to recede at around the 12 hour mark. The feeding procedure is then repeated.
Once you go through a number of feeding cycles and are seeing that your starter is vigorously bubbling and its volume is just beginning to recede at the end of your feeding cycles, then you can feel confident that you have an active, mature starter. Only then would I start to bake with it and perhaps think about refrigerated storage.
Thanks for the swift response Steve. Just to clarify before i crack on: The 30g of starter mentioned in your response – is this from the starter created on day 1 with the 50% hydration then coverted to 166% with the addition of the 30g starter and 125% Water and 100%.after converting to the recipe above for 166% is the rest fo the starter that hasn’t been used discarded. When continuing with the 12 hour cycles of feeding do i empty all but 30g of sarter and proceede with regimen. Thanks Darren
Darren,
Please see my personal e-mail to you.
Steve,
I started my starter with King Arthur Bread Flour (that’s all i had when I got the bug!) and it seems to be responding well after 4 days. I feed it once a day for the first 2 days and now every 12 hours. Im starting with 4 oz of starter and adding 4oz of water and 4oz of flour. it seems to now be rising and falling in way less than 12 hours. I am away from the house for about 12 hours at work and when I get home I find the sides of the jar have evidence of this. I then feed it and within 4 hours it has doubled.
Am I on the right track?
Should I add some rye or whole wheat flour some time?
Thanks,
PDog
P.S. – My goal is to make bubbly sourdough pizza crust like in San Francisco. mmm!
Hi PDog,
It sounds as if your starter has activated and you are now at the point where you need to adjust your feeding schedule such that, 12 hours after feeding, your starter has expanded to maximum volume and is just beginning to recede. If you are storing your starter at around 72°F, you might try cutting back on the starter inoculation amount during feeding (try using 2 oz. of starter to 4 oz. each of flour and water). If you are storing your starter at a higher temperature than 72°F, you may try leaving the starter inoculation amount the same and reducing the storage temperature.
Thank you for this post! I just made my first starter a couple of days ago. I used organic unbleached bread flour and organic whole wheat flour, made a 50/50 mixture, and mixed with water to make a thick batter. I put a tea towel over it and left the window open to keep the room at about 65-75 degrees and left it alone. At around 28 hours after I mixed it, my starter had lots of bubbles, already doubled in size, and smelled pretty awful (like a sour, acetone, paint smell). I looked all over the web and your post is the only one that explained the leuconostoc bacteria. Thanks again!