Starting a Sourdough starter

Making a sourdough starter at home is a simple process that relies on just two ingredients—flour and water. With a little patience, you can cultivate a natural culture of wild yeast and bacteria that will give your sourdough bread its rise, flavor, and character. Here’s a straightforward guide to getting started in approx. 30 days.

What Is a Sourdough Starter?

A sourdough starter is a mixture of flour and water that captures wild yeast and lactic acid bacteria from the environment and the flour itself. Over several days, these microorganisms establish a stable culture that can be used to ferment bread dough naturally, without commercial yeast.

"Borrow" a Sourdough Starter!

Before you spend 30 days making your starter, there is a easier way! If you have anyone in your area that already has a starter, you can take a bit of that one and feed it. Within a day it grows and is ready to use! Shoot us a message to see if you want to get some of our starter (located in The Netherlands).

What You’ll Need

• Flour: Whole wheat or rye flour is often recommended for starting out, since they contain more nutrients that encourage fermentation.

• Water: Filtered or dechlorinated water works best, as chlorine can slow or inhibit microbial activity. If you live in a country with good quality tap water, you can use that as well.

• A container: A glass jar or plastic container that can hold at least 2 cups of mixture and can be sealed.

• A spoon or spatula: For mixing.

• A kitchen scale: To measure flour and water accurately.

Step-by-Step Process

Day 1

• Mix 60 g (about ½ cup) of flour with 60 g (about ¼ cup) of water in your clean container.

• Stir until no dry flour remains.

• Loosely cover the container and leave it at room temperature.

Day 2

• You may see little to no activity yet, which is normal.

• Discard about half of the mixture. You can bake cookies or any other recipe from the discarded amount. Just make sure you add backing powder to your pastry at this stage as the starter is by far not strong enough to rise on its own as discars.

• Add 60 g fresh flour and 60 g water, mixing well.

Days 3–5

• Continue the process of discarding half and feeding with equal parts flour and water once every 24 hours.

• By Day 3 or 4, you should see some bubbles, a slightly sour aroma, and a rise in volume after feeding.

Day 6 and beyond

• When the starter reliably doubles in size within 4–8 hours of feeding and has a pleasantly tangy smell, it’s ready to use for baking.

• It could take upto 14 to even 30 days to get there.

  
  

Tips for Success

• Warmth: A consistent room temperature (around 70–75°F / 21–24°C) helps the culture thrive.

• Switching flours: Once established, you can maintain the starter with all-purpose flour if preferred.

• Storing: If you’re not baking often, keep the starter in the refrigerator and feed it about once a week.

Using Your Starter

Once mature, your sourdough starter becomes the natural leavening for bread, pancakes, waffles, and more. Each feeding keeps it alive, and over time, it will develop its own unique flavor profile. If you are on holiday for a few weeks. Take out 60% of your starter before leaving and replenish with fresh flour and water. Place in a cold refrigirator. After you come back, the starter is likely a bit watery sour. Replenish again and let it recondition to a more firm starter before using it.