If you have been in the “crunchy community” for any amount of time, chances are you know someone who makes their own sourdough. Sourdough is a traditional way to prepare grains and though it requires a little work, the benefits more than make up for it. In this blog we will talk about how to create a sourdough starter, how to maintain the starter, and the benefits of baking sourdough.
Health Benefits of Sourdough
Before we dive into how to create a sourdough starter, let’s talk about why you should consider making it in the first place.
Sourdough starter is a combination of fermented flour and water that uses yeast and good bacteria to help bread rise. Sourdough has been around for centuries as a way to maintain the active yeast needed to make bread. Before you could buy instant yeast in little packets, maintaining a starter was a common practice. Like most foods in a traditional foods diet, sourdough takes longer to make than most bread we eat today but allowing it to ferment produces lots of good bacteria that helps make sourdough easier to digest.
Phytic acid is an anti-nutrient found in grains, beans, seeds, and nuts. When it is consumed, it binds to other minerals and makes it difficult for your body to absorb them. Through the process of fermentation, the phytic acid levels in sourdough decrease making the bread easier to digest. People with gluten sensitivity (not celiac) may find that sourdough bread is easier for them to digest than regular bread.
Because the phytic acid is broken down in sourdough bread, it is more nutritious for you too. You are using the same flour to make sourdough as regular bread but, the fermentation process makes the nutrients more accessible to you. Your body is able to take those nutrients and actually use them instead of the phytic acid attacking your system.
Sourdough bread also tastes better than regular bread. I know this is an opinion, but I have met very few people who did not love the slightly tangy taste of sourdough.
How to Create a Sourdough Starter
There are three simple ways to get your own starter.
- Find a friend who already has a healthy starter going.
- Buy a packet of dehydrated cultures and follow the steps.
- Or make a starter from scratch using flour and filtered water.
No matter which way you choose, you will need a glass jar for storing, a coffee filter to put on top of the jar and a kitchen scale for feeding your starter once it is going.
If you know someone who makes sourdough, don’t be afraid to ask them for some starter! It is not a burden to them I promise. The way starter works you have to discard a portion of it every time you feed it. So, people consistently have some they can give away.
Option two is buying a packet of dehydrated cultures and following the steps to make the starter. This consists of feeding the cultures water and flour every 12-24 hours for about a week until you start to see bubbles appearing. You will then need to continue to feed the starter every 12 hours for a week or two to strengthen it before you can start making a loaf of bread. This is a good option for total beginners who don’t have much experience with any kind of cooking.
The third option is to make your starter completely from scratch with flour and filtered water. To do this, you will need to add 1/2 cup of flour and 1/4 cup of filtered water to your glass jar. Stir it all together, cover it with the coffee filter, and let sit for 24 hours. After 24 hours, you will discard half of the mixture and repeat the process, 1/2 cup flour and 1/4 cup filtered water. Wait another 24 hours and discard again. You will do this for 4 days. On day 5, you should start to see some bubbles!
At this point, start feeding your starter every 12 hours (discarding half each time). After a few days of this your starter should be doubling in size every 6(ish) hours. Congrats! You are ready to make some bread!
How to Maintain a Sourdough Starter
Once you have successfully created a sourdough starter (or snagged one from a friend) there is maintenance required to keep it alive. You basically have two options with this part. One, you can keep your starter in the fridge or two, you can keep it on the countertop.
If you plan to use your starter often (every day or every other day), I suggest keeping it on the counter. If you plan to only make bread once a week, feel free to keep it in the fridge. When the starter is kept on the counter, it will need to be fed at least once a day. When kept in the fridge, the starter can be fed once every two weeks.
If you are keeping your starter in the fridge, take it out the night before you plan to make bread and feed it. This will give it time to rise and activate all those little cultures. When you are keeping it on the counter, make sure you feed it at least six hours before you plan to start.
How much sourdough starter you want to keep on hand is really up to you. Some people like to always have large amount ready to go. I personally only keep enough to make one or two loaves of bread at a time because that suits our family.
So, take your starter, discard about half of it, and then get out your kitchen scale, filtered water, and flour. You can use any flour to feed your starter. But try to make sure it is a high quality one like King Arthur or Bob’s Red Mill. I typically add about 60 grams of flour and 60 grams of water to my starter every time I feed it. Then, I mix it all up and cover lightly with the coffee filter.
Conclusion
It is as simple as that! I think people get scared to try sourdough because they think maintaining the starter will be a lot of work. But it really only takes a few minutes and then you can pop it in the fridge if you do not plan to use it.
