Make Your Own Sourdough Starter

P.S. Happy New Year!!!

I saw this article, and checked the fridge I actually had an opened can of pineapple juice that had been open for about two days. It seemed the old juice gave me quicker results. Aprox 24 hours latter I had bubbles and a great sour smell. In case anyone is have problems with fermentation the “aged” pineapple juice has given me a great response.
Happy eating and entertaining

My starter exploded this evening shortly after I added the 5 1/4 tbs of flour and 3 tbs of water. It blew the lid off the plastic container and left a nice mess on the ceiling and kitchen cabinets, but I am thrilled that it is alive. I have transferred it to a large container but now it doesn’t look so active. Did exploding kill it?

Exploding starter–too funny! Mine’s still on the counter and I’ve been covering it with a piece of cloth held on by a rubber band.
The surplus starter I put in the fridge. With the addition of a little salt, it makes a good dosa/crepe batter.
I have been experimenting with 100% whole grain starter and bread. So far I like spelt. (The sourdough beasties in my kitchen seem to like it better than wheat.) Do you have any recipes/tips for whole grain sourdough bread?

100% whole grain sourdough would be ideal.
I’m specifically wondering about the best techniques to use–number of risings, density of dough, using the no-knead method, etc. Appreciate any insights you might have.

My husbands grandmother used to make sourdough bread all the time. She got her starter from her grandmoter when she got married. She passed away in 1990 at the age of 79. I would like to continue the tradition of sourdough she had. We have a video tape of her making her bread. The way she did it does not sound the same as all that I have been reading on the internet and your way. She used to save a ball of dough from her batch of bread before cutting it into loaves (this dough included all the ingredients of bread dough such as salt, sugar, and shortening). She would then leave this ball of dough on her counter until bedtime then put it in the frig. The next time she wanted to make bread she would take out her ball of dought the night before bread baking day. Mix it with 4 cups warm water and 5 cups all purpose white flour. Let this sit on her stove until morning then mix in salt, sugar, and shortening, extra flour until bread dough consistency. Let rise 2 hrs then punch down, take out her ball of dough for next time then, cut her loaves and put in pan to rise for 2 hrs. She would bake for 1 hr. This was usually done for lunch time. I have explained all this because I would like to know if you have heard of this way of doing sourdough? I have tried to get it to work and I cannot. I would like to continue to do it her way (it must work, she did it for over 50 years this way) I don’t know if I have to start with a starter like you suggest then just take out a ball of dough or what. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Sorry this was so long. Terry

I agree, mostly what I have seen are wet starters. I will continue to try to get a good starter going and once I have that maybe I can try her technique. Thanks for getting back to me and I really enjoy watching your videos. It’s always good to see what something is suppose to look like. Thanks again, Terry

Hi, I found a recipe for a sourdough starter in a small book, more of a pamphlet really titled “Healthy Bread recipes & menu planer” and it is:

- 2 cups warm water
- 2 cups flour
- 1 Tbl. Dry yeast
- Mix ingredients
- Cover bowl with towel (to allow airborne yeast to enter, it explains)
- Let sit in warm place for 2-5 days Stirring liquid back into starter daily
- Starter is ready to use when it has a “Sour and yeasty Aroma”

I have noticed that none of the recipes I have found online have used dry yeast is this a valid method? and what do you think of this recipe?

Hi Eric
We are interested in making a starter for pancakes. What kind of flour do you recommend for sour dough pancakes. Could we still use your receipe you gave on the video?
Thanks, Jerry

Hi Eric-

I just found your site tonight, and I’m really enjoying what I’ve seen so far.

Last week I got the bug to try and make my own natural starter, so I mixed together 1 cup of Bob’s Red Mill whole wheat flour, and 1 cup of unbleached AP, plus some filtered water. I stuck it in a cupboard uncovered for several days, feeding it daily. I managed to luck out, and develop a very nice colony of yeast, that so far has almost no sour flavor to the dough. Some may consider this a fault, but since I’m not all that partial to very sour doughs, I find it to be a bonus, especially with the incredible flavor I got from my first loaf. The only thing besides flour and water that I added was around 2 tsp of balsamic vinegar around the 4 day mark, to lower the ph just a bit. I’m sold on using the starter, as I thought the flavor was MUCH better than what I was getting with commercial yeast.

Here’s a link to what my first loaf looked like: [image posted below by Breadtopia]

This was kneaded in the stand mixer, rather than doing a "no-knead" version.

Thanks for your hard work!

Chris

Hi Eric,
That is interesting that some consider a sour taste to be a fault–it’s a fault I’ve always enjoyed! However, each time I’ve made sourdough bread the degree of sourness has always been a rather haphazard event. Do you have any sort of list of factors which influence sourness?
Also, as long as we’re sharing starter recipes, mine was a few tablespoons water, fresh spelt flour and a little yogurt. I waited until it showed some bubbles to feed it for the first time (on the same mixture). Since then I’ve just been feeding it water and spelt flour.
Christina

I too have been on a quest for the very-sour-sourdough, and to no avail. A slight tang seems to be the best achievable, and I’m looking for the saliva-inducing sourness I’ve encountered only in commercially produced breads. What are they doing?

I’ll try converting some of my starter to rye, but in the meantime, does really no one know how to create a fiercely sour sourdough?

Here in sub tropical Brisbane I can grow yeasts under my armpits this time of year! So the starter has taken nicely. Day 3/Step 2 already. It’s very humid here: 75% and 26 celsius at 7 o’clock at night.

I also happen to live 200 metres from the Golden Circle Cannery which cans all the pineapples in Australia that are canned so the coincidence was appealing to me as everyday I get to sniff pineapples on the wind and can walk to the cannery shop for my supplies if the impulse takes me. I also have a bread flour shop 200 metres the other way across the railway line that brings the pineapples that are canned in the Golden Circle Cannery that lives on the creek called Cannery Creek…..

I got bubbling activity in the mix after the first 24 hours.

I am passionate about spelt and am hell bent on setting upon the best of all possible spelt recipes as it is a cantankerous flour…

As a follow-up on very sour sourdough starters, I did some research and determined that most of the very sour sourdoughs are “fakes.” I don’t mind the concept of adding acetic or citric acid (both were advised to me), but I suppose I am a little let down.

After some experimentation, I am fairly convinced that converting to a rye starter has made for a tarter bread.

Some other sour bread fans have strongly advised keeping a pretty dry starter as well, more of a dough than a batter. In combination, now, I have a lump of dry-ish rye starter in my fridge.

In keeping with these theories, I can say for sure that my bread is getting steadily more sour.

I also use a half a cup of starter per loaf.

Eric,

Yes, my name is really Sunday. I was born on a Wednesday and my parents were hippies… all starting to make sense now, yes?

It’s funny, I was just having a conversation with my mother where she was insisting that my Ohio yeast “just isn’t sour,” and then you respond with a similar suspicion. If I weren’t such a wet blanket, I’d think there was some mysterious powerful force at work, drawing me to a perfectly sour loaf of bread… yay!

Also as a side note, if you use the online photo tool Flickr (or even if you don’t), some folks have started a no-knead bread group. I’d like to see the group really take off – I like looking at other people’s breads almost as much as I like eating them.

Anyhow, in case you don’t allow HTML, here’s the long link: http://www.flickr.com/groups/noknead/

Hello Eric,
Yesterday I received my La Cloche Oblong Clay Baker. It is just as I expected, however, the top and bottom do not align. Is that something I should be concerned about?
I am an absolute rookie about about this entire bread baking experience and perhaps it is supposed to be this way and I just do not know it. ):
Thank you,
Cam

How much starter does your recipe make? and it is ok to use other types of flour instead of wheat correct? Also, does the soury flavor get more potent and better with time? thankyou.

my starter worked! but i had a question… how sealed does the container i keep it in have to be? should i possibly take out the rubber grommet in the lid to make it not air tight or poke a hole in the lid or something? also, my starter seems to not be as lively as it was a few days ago… did i sufficate it or something? but it still does smell sour like sourdough does, or am i just missing the peaking time for my starter? thanks.

Hello!

I’m a total novice at baking bread, but I’m very interested in learning how, and especially want to explore creating and using my own homemade wild yeast starter. (I like that phrase too!)

Recently I’ve been experimenting with making kefir out of raw milk, using real kefir grains. Someone here mentioned using yoghurt to get a starter going, and I wondered if maybe it might be possible to use some of my home brewed kefir instead of pineapple juice, since kefir is already fermented, and contains all sorts of lively yeasts and beneficial bacteria. Do you think this might work?

Any input on this idea would be appreciated, and thanks, Eric, for this very informative site with these great videos!

elan

I too have successfully followed your sourdough recipe. I have not tried to make bread yet. I did make another sourdough starter and I used the recipe that was in my Breadman recipe book. It called for 2 cups of flour, 2 cups of water and 1 tablespoon of yeast. It worked and I got a starter and I made one loaf of white bread with it using the Breadman recipe. I chose not to put in the optional 1 tablespoon of oil and I used 1 tablespoon of Splenda instead of sugar. It raised fine and it was good but it was not sour. It is a dense bread. I didn’t think it was very flavorful but I had made a loaf of whole wheat bread the day before and used 3 tablespoons of Splenda brown sugar instead of the called for real brown sugar. It was very good and had much flavor but I also added the 3 tablespoons of oil that the receipe called for.

So now I am excited to use the whole wheat starter in some wheat bread. I have searched on line for a sourdough whole wheat receipe for the bread machine and I have found a few. I will try it this next week.
Thank you for all of your effort and time with your video. I found it very helpful.
I started doing this because my daughter came home with the Amish Friendship bread recipe and starter. We did that and of course it is delicious. My daughter said she would like to try sourdough for other types breads so that is how we started with it.

Thanks again.
Diane A

Hi there. I’ve just read Terry’s comments of 27th January regarding a dough starter and then found a recipe for its creation in Jamie Oliver’s “Happy Days With The Naked Chef” (that’s its English title, it may be called something else in the US). His recipes are always reliable and very straightforward. I’m going to give it a go but first need to source some organic rye flour. I didn’t want to copy the details straight over because of potential copyright infringement. What do you think?

Hi Mary

If you’re in the UK, Doves Farm do organic rye flour – Sainsburys sell it, I think. I get mine from my local health food shop but the supermarkets definitely sell Doves Farm. http://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/stockists.htm would tell you.

Hi, Regarding my post of 30th May, here is the recipe for a dough starter, taken from “Happy Days With The Naked Chef” by Jamie Oliver – the link with Amazon sounds an excellent idea. The first time will take six days and after that you’ll always have a piece of the dough starter for next time.

Day One: Mix 500g/1lb 2oz of organic rye flour with enough water to make a soft dough, in a bowl. Put it outside for an hour, then bring it inside to a warm place and cover with cling film.

Day Two: It will start to bubble. Leave it alone.

Day Three: The mix will continue to bubble and will go slightly grey. At this point, stir in a handful of flour and little bit of water, enough to get the mixture back to the same consistency as Day One. Leave it again, still covered.

Day Four: Leave it alone.

Day Five, afternoon: By now, you’ll have a beery, malty-smelling, ashy-coloured mixture, full of natural yeasts, with loads of character. Make your bread by adding all of this starter dough mix to 1kg/2lb 3oz strong flour, then adding enough water to make a firm, pliable dough that is not sticky. Knead it for a good 5 minutes.

Remove a 500g/1lb 2oz piece of dough for your next starter BEFORE adding any salt, cover and put to one side, ready to repeat the process the next day, and so on, etc.

Add salt if you want to. Shape the dough and put it into a bowl or tin lined with a floured tea-towel. Leave for 14 hours.

Day Six, morning: Bake the bread. Preheat the oven to 190 Celsius / 375 Fahrenheit / Gas Mark 5. Gently turn the dough out onto a floured baking tray, cut quite deep slashes into it, and bake for 1 hour or until it is crisp and sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. Allow to cool.

Sounds easy doesn’t it? I hope Terry finds it useful as well as everyone else.

Does it give a different taste to the sour dough in San Francisco and will this recipe work with the conditions in New Zealand because to make sour dough i was told you have to have the extact right conditions.

Thanks

When looking for the right word to describe the “sour” smell, I think fermented hits the nail on the head. My Polish husbands grandmother used to bake sourdough bread in a wood fired brick oven from grains she grew on her farm and ground fresh on the spot. Hence, bread from the store is just plain awful to him. Since this was my first try at making sourdough culture, he reassured me that the fermented smell was exactly what it should smell like! My first starters worked perfectly, thanks to all the great info Eric provided. It’s really amazing that such simple ways of life (like making your own sourdough culture) are becoming lost arts. Thanks again Eric for the wonderful videos and info.

Kalindi

FYI:
I made four sourdough starters about a week ago. Three following the pineapple juice method on this site, except one had pineapple juice, one had water, and one had water with 0.4-1% citric acid by weight (the same as pineapple juice). The fourth was a starter following the recipe in “The Professional Chef” which is a textbook-like cooking book put out by the culinary arts institute. This starter has much less liquid in it than the others and is more like a piece of stiff dough.

My results: The professional chef starter turned up as a failure and actually molded. The three starters based on the pineapple method turned out identical in every way, although the pineapple juice seemed just the slightest bit more active earlier (maybe due to extra sugar from the juice). I should note that after about 2 days the starter with just pure water in it had a funny smell compared with the two with citric acid, but after that it matched the others.

Take from that what you will, thanks for the info Eric.

JB

Hi Eric,
will tap water filtered through a “Britta” water filter pitcher be ok to use as ” The purified water” in the sourdough starter recipie?

hi eric,,well i thought my sourdough starter that i made five days ago wwas viable..however,my nk bread had practically no rise..which is amazing since my starter has huge air pockets in its jar in the fridge..followed all the instructions to a t and i have a lovely door stop..should i chuck the starter and start again…???

I am a visual learner and appreciate your time in making the videos. I am only 24 hours into my starter and already have some minor activity. I have two questions. The first, how long after the starter is finished can you utilize it for baking? The second, what can one do to determine the “Sour-ness” of the end product? Beginner here!

Thanks

My sourdough bread using my potato water and ap white flour sd starter turned out very well.I baked it in my Le Creuset pot for the instruted time,I believe I can reduce my baking time by atleast 5 minutes since my bottom crust was almost burnt! It didnt hurt anything,bottom crust tasted like toast which didnt bother me much. It proofed nicely and tasted (inner part) as sourdough bread should.I should also mention that I used all ap white flour,no whole wheat.I have taken pictures but I am not sure of how to post them?

I have made (nyt) no knead bread many times with very good results, I found that making no knead sourdough bread just as easy to make as the (nyt)no knead bread.If you would like to see others pictures of no knead bread (including mine)go to sausagemaking.org forum and do a search for ” The New York Times – A New way to make bread? ” I have enjoyed seeing all the pictures and comments on thier efforts on making this bread. Just though you might like to see them too.Best wishes!

Michelle

Eric,

My starter “started” out well,but fizzled out. I read from previous articles and added some vinegar to the mix. I then had minor fermentation, and fizzled out again. In a desperate attempt I dipped my finger in a small bag of saf-instant (S.I.Lesaffre) and stirred the mixture. I know that is frowned upon by bread makers, but I live very close to the coast. Thus, I keep the AC at low temperatures. Therefore, I am assuming that climate, hummidity, and elevation could play a role in successful or un-successful starters. Having done that, it is activated. Lots of bubbles, and pressure when I release the lid. All that being said, It has been about 14 days at room temperature, and smells wonderfully sour, is it still safe to bake with? I have fed it daily and was not sure when to refrigerate the starter? Thanks for the well packaged shipment! The two La Cloche bakers and proofing basket were received in excellent condition. Regards!

I used raw apple juice instead of pineapple, I had checked that they both had the same quantity of acid present, apple of course being malic instead of citric, it worked very well for me, lovely apple smell along with the sour smell present at first.

I am now living in Singapore and they don’t have most of the grocery items familiar to us in the US. What is the unsweetened pineapple juice are you referring to? Is it the juice from canned pineapple or fresh squeezed pineapple juice? Thanks.

For those who are still struggling with making your own sourdough starter, Peter Reinhart in his book “Bread Baker’s Apprentice” has a different sourdough starter recipe than the one posted on breadtopia.com website. I just started it and it’s really strong and active. If anyone is insterested in it, please let me know and I will send it to you.

OK, here we go.

Seed Culture:

Day 1: 1 cup dark rye or coarse whole rye (pumpernickel-grind) flour, 3/4 cup water at room temperature. Mix the flour and water together in a bowl until they form a stiff ball of dough. Do not worry if the dough is very stiff, but be sure that all the flour is hydrated. Press this piece of dough into a 4-cup measuring beaker and place a piece of tape on the beaker to mark the top of the dough. Cover the beaker with plastic wrap and leave it at room temperature for 24 hours.

Day 2: 1 cup unbleached high-gluten or bread flour, 1/2 cup water at room temperature. The dough should not have risen much, if at all, during this time. In a mixing bowl, combine the Day 2 ingredients with the Day 1 sponge, mixing with your hand or a spoon until all the ingredients are evenly distributed. The dough will be somewhat softer and wetter than the Day 1 sponge. Return this to the beaker, pressing it down, and replace the old tape with a new piece of tape to mark the spot. Cover with plastic wrap and ferment for 24 hours at room temperature. Do not be put off by the strong, unpleasant aroma of the dough. This will eventually brighten as it nears the finish line.

Day 3: 1 cup unbleached high-gluten or bread flour, 1/2 cup water at room temperature. Check to see if there has been a rise in the dough. There will probably be some fermentation but not a lot, perhaps a 50 percent rise. Regardless, discard half of the starter (or give it to a friend to cultivate), and mix the remaining half with the Day 3 ingredients, as on the previous day. It will be a little wetter. Again, return it to the beaker. It should press down to the same height as on Day 2. Re-tape the beaker to mark the top of the dough, cover, and ferment for 24 hours.

Day 4: 1 cup unbleached high-gluten or bread flour, 1/2 cup water at room temperature. The sponge should have at least doubled in size; more is even better. If it is still sluggish and hasn’t doubled in size, allow it to sit out for another 12 to 24 hours. Otherwise, repeat as on Day 3, discarding half of the starter and mixing the remaining half with the new ingredients, returning it to the beaker as before. Cover and ferment until it at least doubles in size. This may take 4 to 24 hours. It is okay if it triples in size, but because it is now fairly soft and spongelike, it will not be able to sustain that large of a rise without falling. If it falls easily when you tape the beaker, that is the sign that your seed culture is ready to be turned into barm, or mother starter.

Barm (Makes approximately 6 cups or 2 1/2 pounds barm)
3 1/2 cups unbleached high-gluten or bread flour
2 cups water at room temperature
1 cup seed culture

Stir together the flour, water and seed culture in a mixing bowl (you can discard the remaining seed culture or give it to a friend to build into his or her own barm). Make sure the seed culture is evenly distributed and all the flour is hydrated. It will make a wet, sticky sponge similar to a poolish. Transfer this sponge to a clean plastic, glass, or ceramic storage container as large as the barm. When transferring the barm into the container, repeatedly dip your hand, spatula, or bowl scraper in water to keep the barm from sticking to it. Cover the container with a lid of plastic wrap and ferment at room temperature for approximately 6 hours, or until the barm is bubbly. The plastic wrap will swell like a balloon, as will a plastic lid. When this happens, open the lid or release the plastic to let the gas escape (try not to breathe it as it escapes – the carbonic gas mixed with ethanol fumes will knock you across the room). Replace the cover and refrigerate overnight before using. The barm will be ready to use the next day and will remain potent for 3 days. After that, or if you use more than half during the next 3 days, you will need to refresh it.

A few comments from me:

When I mixed 1 cup of rye flour and 3/4 cup of water in day 1, it was very wet, like soup, and there was no way I could have kneaded it. So I don’t know what Peter is talking about here. Maybe it’s the pathetic rye flour here in Singapore that doesn’t have much body.

I stored day 1’s mixture in an air-tighht glass jar with a rubber seal and wire closure. I didn’t expect much activities as Peter said there wouldn’t be much after 24 hours. Well, I was very surprised to see the dough had risen significantly, if not double, at least 70%. When I opened the lid, there was a loud pop due to the gas build-up, and strong unpleasant smell. The mixture is well underway of fermentation.

As I followed the intructions for day 2 and day 3, the dough got stiffer because it seems to me I am adding more flour than water with the ratio Peter gave. But things look very active and the dough rises very well. So I guess everything is just fine.

Hope this helps.

Thanks both for the input. Just to clarify, I think both of you (and particularly Shuang) are suggesting that I make sure that post feeds, the starter gets bubbly and risen BEFORE putting it back in the fridge. Am i right in interpreting it this way? Tatiana

Thanks!! Will experiment.

I believe breadtopia has a very good point. I trust you have tried this slow cold ferment method and have had good results? Will try again next time when I feed. Can someone confirm if my understanding is correct in that I should every time discard or use up more than half the sourdough starter and then feed it?

My mother kept her starter for a week or perhaps more in a glass jar, in the darkness of her dirt-floor cellar, on a stair just two steps down through the doorway. She kept it covered with either a piece of wax paper or cheese cloth, secured with a string. She only added flour & water at the weekly baking.

I really enjoyed your videos. I have a question about the water for the starter. We live in a rural, wooded area in NJ and have a private well. Can I use this as it has no chemicals or do you recommend bottled? Thanks!

What do you think of the Nancy Silverton sourdough starter iin her book Breads from La Brea Bakery. I made one a year ago and it’s just great.
R

Thanks for your helpful video and brilliant sourdough starter. My first try was successful (took a week to become really active), and I have made my first ever loaf of sourdough bread without any commercial yeast. I used the no-knead sourdough recipe from your site and it was outstanding. The flavour, aroma and texture leave the regular NYT loaf for dead, although that is a good bread too. I even caught my husband, who hates homemade bread, cutting himself a couple of extra slices after dinner last night. I was wondering: how much starter should I use to make a loaf of “normal”, i.e. kneaded bread? Thanks again for your wonderful bread site. Susan.

I have started 2 starters-one white & one whole wheat. They both grew & are now back to the amount of liquid I started with-is this right??
Also, most of my recipes call for 2 cups of the starter & we have a big family. Is it ok to just add flour & water in equal amounts til I reach the desired amount of starter?
Also, I would love to leave my starters on the counter (not in the fridge) b/c they smell sooo good. I bake A LOT, as long as I feed them a bit each day, surely this is ok??
Thanks.

I like your site,very helpful.I started down the S.D. path last year w/ “Carls” yeast and have a lot of really fat birds around my neighborhood to attest to my prowess in bread baking. Last summer I thot I’d try to build my own local starter.Tried the following w/ white flour,worked well,so why not whole wheat? That worked too.
2 cups ww flour,2 cups 100deg water.stir it up well,cover w/ 3 layers cheese cloth.Put it outside under a tree in 85+ deg weather for 2 days.stir down.It’ll develop a crust and smell like the bottom of a parrot’s cage.Don’t despair.Bring it inside, leave it covered w/ cheese cloth and stir it down every day till it starts to make hooch (Gray color).It will began to smell like it should.Then feed it w/ 1 cup ww flour & 1 cup warm water.When it starts to grow toss all but 1 cup & feed to double plus a tblsp of sugar.Then you have it. This starter is a lot more active than my white flour starters and it will explode if it’s capped after feeding and not allowed to fall back. Cleaning kitchen ceilings is hard(caveat).
Anyway,thats my story and I’m sticking to it.It seems I always have better luck w/ simple stuff.Thanx for your site,I’ve learned a lot.

Hi again, I found some crushed pineapple in the pantry, so I am relieved to say that I used your tried and true recipe for starter. I will let you know in a week or so how it works.

I only have highspeed lite, so the first time I watched the video, the picture only changed twice. The good news is, on the second try the video comes in very well. So, from now on, I will let them play on mute while I read, and then play again to watch and listen. I like to watch the videos because they do give more detail than written instructions ever do.

Thank you for a great site.

Way to go, Kendra. You can wish me luck, I am starting my first sourdough bread loaf this evening. I’ll know how it turns out on Sunday.

Thanks, Eric! Good luck, Sheila. Let us know how the bread comes out. What I love about homemade bread is that even my mess ups are delicious!

Well, that sourdough turned out ok, but I guess I am not an afficionado yet. I would have liked a little sweet to moderate the sour. I don’t have a cloche, so I decide to bake the bread in pans. They were fine, rose well, had a nice crumb, but were not that nice holey texture.

Anyway, today I made a sourdough challah from Maggie Glezer’s book, A Blessing of Bread which Zolablue had described and photographed on The Freshloaf The starter, which I had been keeping in my fridge, worked like a charm and made a high and tasty loaf. I did like the complexity of flavour created by the eggs, the honey, along with the delightful tang of sourdough.

I am going to start some more bread tonight, I am just not sure which one will suit my rather plebian tastebuds. Any suggestions?

Hi Eric, love your site I have been trying to make sourdough bread for about two months now some not bad some not good, I am trying to now make my own starter the pineapple way. I have found that if I keep my pet on the worktop it has a more sour flavour compared to it from the fridge.Also my bread is never white inside even if I use white flour it’s sort of gray looking also I have tried so hard to get big holes but to no avail,can you tell me what I am doing wrong.P.S. I think your recipes are wonderful.P.P.S.I come from Scotland so things are a wee bit different here.

Hi Eric!
You sure opened a can of yeasty beasties with me (can of worms so to speak) I tried the above recipe and I’m having good results with it. I just fed my SD started. Thanks for your website, very down to earth. Love It!

There is a bread book that outlines the rye method…it is called “The Bread Bible” I love the book as is it breaks recipes down into volume/weight and percentage which is great for me as I never follow true recipes! I did successfully follow and begin the starter outlined!

Hi Eric…..I read on your breadtopia web sight that you wondered if it might have been your existing sourdough culture that populates new starts. We recently moved into a brand new house that we can guarantee, has never had sourdough made in it before although I do use a bread machine with insta-yeast, perhaps twice a week. For many years I have wanted to try making sourdough bread, read and viewed your terrific instructions, and couldn’t wait to start my very first culture. From this rural New England forest location, I didn’t even want to waste time running all the way to the store for Pineapple juice. I looked in the fridge and found bottled Concord Grape juice that had been open for about a week and thought, what do I have to loose? A tablespoon of this juice, all purpose white flour and if it fails, I’ll be in to see the grocer next week for the recommended ingredients.

I saw very small bubbles at the end of day two. After stirring, they didn’t come back for many hours. These slight bubbles came and went till the end of day 4 when our purple soup started to look very promising. (I might have peeked and stirred too many times.) I gave it the standard day 5 feeding and wammo….the thing TOOK OFF. Puffy, bubbly and elastic just like in your video. It smells very yeasty with strong notes of grape!! Unless we picked up the insta-yeast, which from your discussions seems doubtful, then wild yeast is available at a sight that hasn’t prepared sourdough in the past. I do hope that homemade sourdough bread isn’t too far off, though. Congratulations for your excellent instructions.

One thing I feel compelled to point out. In the video you were using the small, plastic bowls with lids and you were very careful to close them, but not seal them. I also noticed that the container you used for the final starter’s home was a flip-top jar, the kind that can usually be sealed very tightly. I notice that it appears your jar does not have it’s plastic or silicone seal in place, and you never used the locking mechanism. But you never pointed out why that might be.

As a warning to others, do not keep your fermenting starter in a sealed container. The starter generates the same Carbon Dioxide gas that makes your bread rise, and if that gas accumulates in a sealed container, it could explode. For the small plastic bowls, that probably means the lids come off with a *pop*. If you sealed that big crock (particularly if it was glass) you’d have a small-scale bomb and that could be dangerous.

I found a recipe in Peter Reinharts book Crust and Crumb. It’s on page 38 and it’s called Pate Fermentee (old dough) Pre-ferment. I hope that helps.

Success!

Until step 3 I barely noticed anything happening. The most I noticed were slit like bubbles in the dough. I added the step 3 ingredients yesterday evening and in the morning I noticed no change at all. The dough filled about 1/6 of the small plastic bowl I was using. When I came back from work 12 hours later the rising dough reached the cover of the bowl and pushed it up! Unbelievable!

Hello from Paris.

Just writing to confirm that this sourdough recipe works even in France! The wild yeasts here must speak the same language. I shall now attempt your “Poilane”-ish Whole Grain Sourdough. I know my Poilane, so I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Thanks so much for the collection of recipes and info and, wow, the videos are incredible!

Well, I gave some of my starter to a friend yesterday, and we each have a loaf of no-knead started for tomorrow.

Am Dolly here, from Mindano, Philippines (in Asia). I loved your videos, and enjoyed watching them. They were all fantastic, highly informative, very eudcational. For me as an amateur baker, those videos are great tools to learning more about the craft..it’s my passion and I would love to enhance it more. Thank you for the recipes now an addition to my bread recipe collections. I haven’t into commercial baking yet but am just baking breads for the LOVE OF BREAD at home. Moreso, never tried making/using a sourdough starter yet on my bread recipes. What I am using purely as a leavener is the available Instant Yeast in the market. I would like to give a try making my own sourdough starter. The climate here is humid. Shall I need to lessen my number of days for the method in processing the sourdough culture?

Looking forward to more recipes from you.

Best regards from the Philippines.:-)

Hi Eric!

I found your site day before yesterday and really got into the sourdough section. I decided to try making my own starter and got it going that evening. The starter had bubbled over the top of the jar by the time I began making the sourdough pancake recipe that you list. (Okay, the jar was a bit small….) Wow! My kids and husband all loved it. I am very excited because my middle child only eats 27 items–now she eats 28! We served them with pure maple syrup, yum. I began your recipe for the no-knead sourdough bread today and am excited about getting home and making it tomorrow. I do not have a Cloche, but I do have a pizza stone and a stone bread pan–I’m going to try the final proof in a smaller bread pan and turn it onto the stone, then cover it with the stone bread pan. I’ll let you know what happens.

Thanks so much for all of your great work here!
Ellen in Texas

RE: sourdough starter

Hi, thanks for the nice web site. I had to try sourdough for myself after reading this site. I have made a starter that smells very sour and high in alcohol content in just half a day. I started with the following ingredients:

- 3/4 cup flour
- 3/4 cup water
- 1 tbs sweetened condensed milk
- 1/2 tsp brown sugar
- 1 tsp live culture yogurt, Astro brand
- 1/2 tsp live culture sour cream
- 1/3 tsp sea salt (by accident)
- Also…
I cheated a bit by putting a small lump of a pizza dough, about the size of a quarter, from commercial yeast, that I had sitting in the fridge for a couple days.

I live in a warm appartment and this mixture doubled in volume after just a few hours. I mixed it up before going to bed and the next morning, it had doubled again. It smells as though I could get drunk from eating it and it’s very sour.

My very first try at sourdough seems like a success so far, but I haven’t tried baking anything with the starter as yet.

Reez

Hi Eric & Denyce…how are you two? Both of us have been down with a really bad cold since Christmas at our son’s home. Moral? stay away from grandchildren!
Anywho, due to inactivity, my starter, actually the 4th one I have had since yours, died a stinky death! Got a couple by following Sam’s instructions with freshly ground rye flour.
So, this time I am going to try your pineapple juice one again and this time I think it will likely fly! Hope you are both well, Cheers, old Doug in BC who has hit 82 since our last back & forth!

I used your method to great success…until I tried to bake with it. Just as in your experience, I didn’t have any sign of life until about day 3-4. By day 4 my starter was doubling in volume each time I fed it, everything was fantastic. I used basically 1 part sponge to 1.5 parts new flour/water and made a perfect dough ball (per recipe). I went back to check on it after an hour to find that it hadn’t risen the slightest bit. No air, no air bubbles, nothing frothy or yeasty about it- again, even though my starter was very yeasty, doubled in volume just before using, and smelled of sour fermentation. I always use my bread maker for kneading and raising- do you think maybe my bread maker is using too high a temperature for raising and killing these (more sensitive?) wild yeast? The only other option is that my wild yeast are just too weak to raise real dough….what do you think? So frustrating!

I received an Amish Friendship sourdough starter a couple of days ago, and the directions say not to refrigerate. Since I am totally new to this, does that mean I should never refrigerate it? How would I store it?

Thank you for your terrific videos. I am one that needs to both read and see it to learn.

Thanks so much for your help.
Evelyn

The directions at the top says “Do NOT refrigerate. As air gets in the bag, let it out. It is normal for the batter to rise and ferment.” It came in a gallon Ziploc bag and on day 6 (after receiving the bag) I am to add 1 cup of flour, 1 cup of sugar, and 1 cup of milk. Then on day 10 I am suppose to empty the contents into a non-metal bowl and add 1 1/2 cups of flour, sugar and milk. Then divide it up into 4 portions, give 3 away and keep one for myself. The directions says “If you keep a starter for yourself, you will be baking every 10 days.” I don’t know if this means I keep doing this over and over.

I will call the gal that gave it to me. If nothing else, at the end of the 10 days, I could save a little and start over and refrigerate the rest and see what happens.

I will keep you updated.

Have taken the time to read through all the comments (no light task!), and am in a state of panic! My second attempt is on hour 28 and I am not seeing any of the terrific signs of life that most seem to experience. A few (three) bubbles do appear for a short period of time after stirring, but otherwise just placid. Tomorrow a.m. is feeding time, so I’ll see…

About metal utensils. It’s possible that this understanding originated from REAL silverware. Silver can be a powerful antibiotic. Do a Google search for Colloidal Silver and you’ll see.

I don’t think there is any cause for concern with stainless steels.

Hi, Eric:
I got a potato sourdough starter from a neighbor back in 1987. I have been kept by feed it regularly. Recently, due to my extensive travel, my starter died. I have been trying to grow a new paotato flake sourdough starter, but have not been successful. I don’t see the kind livelyness nor smell the wine from the new starter, and it just don’t have much bubbles in the starter. Could you tell me what I have been doing wrong?
Joann

NEWS FLASH! NEWS FLASH!
This morning was 48 hours after the beginning of my third attempt at a starter! As with the second, there appeared to be some activity – bubbles and a “frothy” appearance. Therefore, it was with great trepidation I began step 2 – the moment of death of attempt number 2. Added the flour, and as I removed the pineapple juice from the frig a light bulb started to glimmer. “Could the cold juice have been too much of a shock to delicate number 2″, I wondered. After all, we are talking creation here.
Covered my bases and brought the juice to room temperature. Now, six hours and 1 stirring later, it seems to be hanging in there. Could that have been my problem???

Thanks,
J.

Thank you so much for the inspiration. I have been searching for a way to get started at making my own bread at home and your videos make it seem possible. I plan to start right away. I’d really like to mill my own flour so I’ll start pulling my supplies together first.

I did make a nice starter once but wasn’t impressed with the way the bread turned out so I tossed the whole lot. On to another try. Try, try again, right?

I wanted to add that your friendly responses and kindnesses make you seem so approachable. A great thing for the novice. Thanks again,
Jan

I think I am very relieved that my attempt to make starter worked on the very first try. Since then I have been making a loaf 3-4 times a week with great success. I was ill for over a week and ignored my poor starter completely. DH pitched the big jar in the garbage (I think I left it on the counter for about three days with no food), but I restarted from my little jar and it is going great guns again. Now that I trust it, there will be no big jar. I used to keep leftovers in it, just in case I needed to find a bit to re-start with.

Ok, attempt #2 was going extremely well as I previously reported (it must be that 49er yeast in the air) then I moved on to the step where I added water instead of juice. I bebopped on over to the sink and did the deed. My starter immidiately became far less vigorous. I was like “uh oh”, this water must be super treated. So I just let it be until the next feeding as it still had some bubbles which means yeasties even if they are sick, it just acted “ill”. On the next feeding I used purified water. It started a bit slow but then sprang to vivid life in a couple hours- I was amazed. Yay, I saved my little yeasties. I guess the water can matter a whole lot.

I have started another which spent the first 3 days (instead of just one) uncovered outside during much of the day. Hey, I might catch an even better wild super yeasie if I persist- you never know.

As far as taste. Is there any significant difference in starter that is kept whole wheat as opposed to white in taste? Or am I going to get approximately the same taste. What do experienced people do? Do they convert to white to feed it and then if they need another flour type they take a bit of the white starter and raise up the yeasties on the other type of flour they are wanting to use?

What happens if one feeds double the amount of starter during a feeding? Say you have one cup starter and you feed it 2 cups to build it up fast instead of the usual one cup.

I have found this to be great fun and I even made pretzels from my failed herman starter. They are pretty yummy.

Paula

Hi Eric,

After a couple of weeks of keeping my starter in the refrigerator with 2 once-a-week feedings, I pulled it out today. It was VERY thick! I added a cup of warm water, stirred it well, and then added 1/2 cup of white flour and 1/2 cup of wheat flour. (I grind my own wheat flour; this was from hard winter wheat.) Then I added everything to my breadmaker and let it mix in there. Three hours later I put it into a 350-degree F. oven for 50 minutes. It turned out perfect! Great crumb, good rising, terrific taste! Thank you so MUCH for teaching me how to do this!

One thing that I have found out with this starter is that it only works about half as well if I add salt to the recipe. So I quit adding salt. I just used salted butter when I ate it. I don’t tend to cook with a lot of salt anyway, but it doesn’t seem to make a big difference on sandwiches anyway. This is the same starter that I made a few weeks ago.

The bread this evening is about 2/3 whole wheat and 1/3 white flour. Not the bread flour, just the plain old white enriched stuff.

Keep doing a GREAT job!

Ellen in Texas

Eric,

Thanks for the great web site! I’m new to making sourdough bread, but was finally able to get a very healthy starter going from unbleached white flour! While I was trying to get that started, I also started some whole wheat starter and now thats going strong as well. Just wondering if there is any point to keeping the both starters? Can I just use the white flour starter for everything?

Thanks again for a great web site!!

Mike

Hi, Eric
I have a question regarding the liguid for the starter. Your recipes uses pineapple juice but i cant find any pineapple juice nearby so i visited a web..Videojug.com. The recipes uses the liquid soaked in raisins for 5 days..will this liquid work with your recipe?

follow up from my first comment

Then add 40 g of whole wheat or rye and 40 g of water mix
and let ferment until doubled in volume at room temperature.
That will give you a nice sour taste.
You can guide the outcome flavor of your bread by fermenting temerature. Low temperature more acid, high temperature more mild.
So if you ferment your bread at high and low temperature you will be getting a rounded flavour.
Enjoy your web site

Hi Eric..
I just did step 3[5 flour/3 water]… My question is…
I have been baking all day and don’t want to use this starter this week, so..
Tomorrow[which would be 24 hours and ready for the 1/2 c/14c] can I put this in the frig as I do my other starters?
Is so… should I feed with the 1/2c 1/4c before the frig or wait til I need it.
Hope this makes sense to you.
Love this recipe for a starter.
thanks again for all your hard work
jo-ann

Mornin Eric
Thanks… My starter appears to be healthy, with rising and foam and bubbles. I am going to complete the 1/2c 1/4c feeding today. stir 2-3 times today. If at the end of today, it shows me it can survive being in the frig, in it goes. I will probably bake with it next week. I will keep you update to the end result.
be blessed
jo-ann

I have thus far tried the “pineapple solution” twice using white flour without success. I am going to try it using whole wheat flour next. Also, I live at an elevation of 2300 feet above sea level in the Sierra-Nevada mountains. Might the elevation be a factor in developing a wild yeast starter?

Hey Eric,

I was introduced to your site by my best friend, after he made some of the best sourdough I have had in years. He was kind enough to give me some starter that he had grown after following your pineapple starter directions.

I wanted to thank you for this great website and for all the great tips you supply.

My little batch of starter has doubled a few times and is now about ready to turn into some bread, so I’ve been watching your no-knead vids. I LOVE THIS WEBSITE.

Thank you thank you thank you!
Glenn

Eric,

Sunday, April 27th, started my starter using freshly ground whole wheat flour and pineapple juice. Oh by the way, I’m in Salt Lake City. The first 48 hours nothing happened – I was consciencious about stirring the mixture. At the end of the first 48 hours I feed my mixture with more whole wheat flour and pineapple juice. At the end of the third day, I was very excited to see that the mixture was bubbling and doing really well. At the end of the four day, the bubbling had settled down drastically, but I could still see that there was a little action going on. I added the flour and purified water. 24 hours later – tonight (May2nd) the mixture smells sour (almost like an alcohol smell). The bubbling is very slight. I added the 1/2 cup wheat flour and the scant 1/4 cup water. Now I’m waiting to see if there will be any action, hoping that I didn’t kill my starter. If in the morning I don’t see any frothy bubbling action, then I’ll try it again. Realize, that this is my first attempt to create a starter and it’s also my first time working with a starter, so I have no idea exactly what I’m looking for except for bubbles and froth.

I have to admit, I’m having a great time experimenting. I’m not giving up yet!!

Dave

Hi Eric,
I want to thank you, first for this great website about bread, second for the really helpful videos, and third for making this a much-needed virtual meeting place for bread bakers.

Thanks to your ‘Make Your Own Sourdough Starter’ video I decided it wasn’t all that complicated (as some of the books out there make it) and I am now the proud parent of a scratch-made sourdough starter (no commercial yeast of course).

I have been baking bread weekly for several years, so perhaps there are friendly yeast hanging out in my kitchen. I knew you were onto something when I had bubbles in my slurry at the end of day one. I would also like to say, in reference to another baker’s comments, that temperature control appears to have helped the speed with which my starter developed its wild yeast. I used my kitchen radiator during the day, and at night I warmed the oven, with my baking stone absorbing the heat, just a notch above room temperature, and this seemed to encourage the yeast’s development.

Thanks again for helping teach me and other bakers that we can do it!

Eric, I have been following your advice for the past few days, my starter is bubbling after I add more flour and water and after I stir it(I can email photos), but it does not double in size or grow at all that I have noticed. Do you know what the problem could be. Has it still not kicked into gear yet?

Hi, I am trying to make that no knead bread that was in the new york times in 2006. it calls for 1/4 teaspoon instart yeast, and the conversion chart that I have found says to times by 3; that seems like too small an amount. 3/4 teaspoon of sour dough starter.
I have just made my starter, and am totally green so can you please help me out.
Maybe you have a nice cheese bread recipe?
Thanks
Carol Bell

Hi Kristen,
First off, it’s nice to find another New England sourdough newbie. My own Connecticut-native starter is now about a month old and bubbling happily. Most important, good luck with your first sourdough bread! You probably know that sourdough starter ripens over time, and your first bread may not be as tangy as those you bake later on. Treat your starter well and it will respond in kind. Happy baking!

Hi Eric…just discovered your website and I am intrigued to try out a sour dough starter right away. Eventually, I am working towards making sourdough pizza…which I have never tried before. It sounds wonderful. I have a question. I am confused as to whether or not to add sugar to pizza dough. Some recipes include it…some do not. What is the purpose of sugar in the dough recipe?

Also, at what point does one begin to store the sourdough starter in the fridge? Is it always kept there once it is established? Linda

I have not tried it, but Rose Levy Beranbaum uses a piece of dough for her sourdough starter. You may be able to find the recipe and instructions at http://www.RealBakingWithRose.com

Hi,

My wife has been allergic to Gluten containing products including bread for many years, we learned that she tolerated breads baked with Sprouted Grains, and have purchased them since 2002. But prior to discovering her allergy I was enjoying making home made breads, and I was missing out on eating my own healthful creations.

I recently researched more deeply the topic of sprouted grains and their many health benefits and order some Organic Sprouted Spelt and Organic Sprouted Wheat flours to use in home baking, and started researching in earnest the old artisan style baking methods to experiment with and came across this and other helpful sites.

I decided through my reading that I would prefer to use sour dough starter for leavening instead of commercial yeast. I worried that my new flours would be a tough sell for yeast as they have been hand sorted, washed, sprouted, dried, and ground. But much to my surprise a few cups water mixed with a few cups flour, and I had very sour starter in 24 hours. I had my first extra sour, sour dough 30 hours after starting my starter. It has now been four days and the starter is more sour and active than anything I have ever seen.

I started a smaller batch at the same time and it is now quite sour as well but it took two or three days to get active. I also started one with unbleached all purpose Flour and it took the longest and is now mildly sour.

Since in ancient times harvest was slow and very much a manual process, much of the grain was naturally sprouted before ever making it to a mill. And in Biblical Times Sprouted Grains were contained in the Law of Health, and because ancient cultures used natural yeast and lengthy fermentation cycles to process their grains, much more nutrition was available in the bread. I am excited to be incorporating these techniques into my own bread making today, and the results are wonderful! Can you say FLAVOR?!

It’s an amazing feeling to make something myself, without modern shortcuts, and to know I am providing a healthy, nutrient rich, natural food to my family. (And that my wife does not have allergies too.)

Sorry I misspelled some words.
With larder I mean pork or bacon
And you eat molasses with the bread and cheese.
With sultanas I mean also raisins
Eveline

Hi Eric!

Just wanted to thank you for this great starter recipe and subsequent posts on maintenance and recipes! I successfully made two starters, one whole wheat and one white, and am getting ready to begin using them. . . . I just posted about it on my blog (linked above).

Thanks for the inspiration and advice! Your website is bookmarked for frequent use!

Best,
Sarah

Eric,

In your sour dough starter video you call for “unsweeted” pineapple jucies meaning with out suger added. I am having a hard time finding anything but pineapple jucies with surgar added.

Can I use it anyway?

Franco

Just made my first sourdough loaf – thanks. The bread has great texture and crust. Two things it wasn’t very sour and although it doubled in size when rising – it spread rather than rose. It was granary flour.

I baked in without a tin – if I put it in a tin would it help it get higher rather than wider.

Thanks, Michael (Ireland)

Hi Michael!
I am a native -born San Franciscian who grew up during my childhood in SF.
At the present, I live in Oregon and have NEVER found any person, store, or bakery who understands how to make or provide SF french bread in the grocery stores. They are all MUSHY.
What would you suggest that I start with in order to make a SF starter which most SF breads are made from and are in restaurants and grocery stores?

Oh, theres a recipe on this site somewhere on how to make your own starter, really easy!

Your mother starter is to ensure you have starter the next time you want to bake. If you bake only once a month you are going to want to get rid of all but about maybe a 1/4 cup of the starter. You’ll need to feed it periodically throughout the month to keep it alive and healthy. I am a sometimes baker too. My starter may sit on my counter a couple weeks without being fed, I keep about a cup or so. When I know I am going to be baking I might get it out and feed it the night before, then again in the morning to make sure it is healthy and strong. Otherwise I kind of neglect it and feed when I think of it. If you get over run with starter you can throw it away or wash it down the sink and only keep what you really need but I hate wasting food like that so I just try to predict how much I’ll need and when and feed to that. Remember on bake day to have enough for what you want to make..some recipes call for 1 cup, some 1 1/2, some 2 cups.

If you keep it in the fridge it feeds slower and probably could go a whole month on only one feeding. In that case I would still get it out and feed it the night before I intend to bake as it would need feeding and it needs to come to proper temp to rise bread.

I’m sure others might have advice too…that’s just what I do.

well pretty fun…I put this together and then left for work…came back 46 47 hours later and nothing……did step 2 ..this time stuck it in the oven with oven light on….5 -6 hours later and I believe its working….smells good and it looks kinda like in your video…i’ll take a pic of it next time

Thanks for taking the time and care with your video about the starter, its great, but even though its pretty much straightforward, could you give me the recipe in bakers percentages, that way it would be simpler for me to strat my starter (pardon my self repeating). Thanks in advance for any help forthcoming….

Hi everyone,

What a very interesting site you have. Came across it by accident.
I am fom the Netherlands and I would like to say to Eveline that rising problem with yeast is familiar to me, When it is warm in Holland the yeast will rise out of the pan (as we say in Holland).
And to Laura from Sri Lanka I can say that the bread named broeder comes from the region West-Friesland. But is known in Holland by several other names aswell.
Other names are Herman, Poffert en Jan in de zak. Which links them to there own region and way of making. Oven, pan on a stove (in former days on a petroleum burner) or even au-bain-marie.

I have an old farm house and was wondering if the sourdough will still rise in the lower end of temp range and how long should i what between feedinsgs if it iis not rising within the 24 hours;

ok thanks. I decided to use a proofing box with a jar of warm water to keep up the temp, I geuss since this is new to me I’m just worried it will not turn out thanks for the help and videos.

I made your recipe and after two days I saw bubling
But I see on the walls of the jar like white cotton and black dots inside
Now I wanna know if this is mold or its ok?
thank you!

Hi Eric,
I want to make your sourdough but I cant find unsweetend or any pineaeple juics. Can I use the juice from canned pineaple slices? It sais on the label “Pinaple slices in light syrup”. There is some added sugar but I saw that in the videos you use it as well.
Thank you for your answer.

Hi Eric
Can you use other citric acid containing juices in place if pineapple juice in the making of your Sourdough starter? If so, what other juices could I use?

Hi Eric! I wanna know how many times a week
do i have to feed my sourdough when iI keep it in the fridge?
And what should I do when I wanna use it again?
how long before should I take it out and how should I feed it
And how long should I wait after feeding it?

And how many flour can I put in one feeding if I need alot?
And should i put it in in a glass jar or a plastic jar
should I cover it fully or live a little open?

Hi Eric, I wanted to ask you about a sourdough starter that I heard about while watching a program called Alone In The Wilderness. It’s about a man named Dick Proenneke who lived in the wilds of Alakska for 30 years alone. Part of his daily meals were something made of sourdough. I always wondered if somebody had any of his recipes and sure enough I found this website. I was succesful in making the sourdough and had it for a couple of years, but it then died and I have to get some more of the dried starter from Lisa. The sourdough hotcakes are fantastic. I really recommend the movies that Dick filmed while in Alaska as well, here’s both sites, let me know what you think. I think it’s great that people have passed this on.

http://www.alaskasgoldenspoon.com/
http://dickproenneke.com/

Thanks Mike

Hi Eric and everyone!
I really want to know, if I can do the starter using the wholemeal rye organic flour. I heard, this is the best flour for our health and the best one to do the starter… what you think about it?

Agnieszka

Dear Breadtopia,

Thank you for your resopnd and advice. I will do what you say.
I am starting tomorrow and hope to join the happy team
of succesfull yeast makers…

I’ve made it to the last stage in the pineapple solution starter recipe. The video said add less than an 1/8 of a cup water, but your printed notes say to add 1/4 or 1/3 cup of water. Unfortunately I didn’t notice the discrepancy until after I already added 1/4 of a cup. So I took a chance and added another teaspoon of flour. I hope that wasn’t a wrong move. I did hear some bubbling sounds which was encouraging. But now I don’t know how to proceed. Do I leave it out for 5 days? When does it go in the refrigerator? How frequently do you feed it? What quantity of flour? Liquid? It’s all new to me. Thanks!

i just did step 5 of your recipe for sourdough starter and so far so good yea!! first time ever that i have had success!! i must tell you tho i didnt have any regular flour the night i was inspired by your video (was LATE one night) so i used what i had in the cupboard SoftasSilk Cake flour!! and it is Working!! the last step i have added white whole wheat (am trying that as hubby doesnt ‘like’ whole wheat so am working him towards it bit by bit
question- our house tends to be cold most of the year (air conditioning in desert heat) so am keeping it in cupboard above the dishwasher- so far that seems to be the warmest spot in the kitchen – is that ok?
also i am not really sure i understand about ‘feeding’ the starter= do you feed it Before or After you use some for baking… am confused
thanks again

I am deaf and would have loved if the video was captioned.. I read the instructions, watched the video once again,, then read the FAQ’s.. then watched the video for the third time.. can’t wait to try it..hope I got it right.. looks wonderful. mary

Bob, thanks for the advice. I just last night managed to get some more unbleached flour (my local grocery store doesn’t carry it and I have to go to another town to Wal-Mart to get it), and I’m going to start feeding more. I guess I must have put it in the refrigerator too soon, even though it was bubbling. Thanks again, everyone, for all your advice. I’ll report back if and when I get it done!

Doof,

I think Bob is right, you just need to feed your starter more. Mine is working great, now.

Good luck.

We all went thru the pains, to a more or lesser degree!
In you second step, you cut back on the ratio. Keep the same ratio as what Eric suggested and you did in your first sentence.
But – to keep down the ‘waste” of flour, let’s cut back on the amount.
Starter a new batch with your existing starter:
1 Tablespoon of starter; 2 Tablespoons of water; 3 Tablespoons of flour.
Next feeding, either discard or put in a separate container, all but one Tablespoon of your starter.
Feed: 1 Tablespoon of starter; 2 Tablespoons of water: 3 tablespoons of flour.
Do this twice a day until you are getting a very vigorous, full of bubbles starter.
Then you can start building up by increasing the amounts BUT use the same ratio.
If I am reviving a dried starter, I start out with one teaspoon of starter and go from there, building up for about 5 or 6 days, depending on the strength of the starter.
The excess that you might throw away can go in a container in your fridge and be used for biscuits or pancakes when you get enough. Waste not, want not.

You got it now! quarter cup starter, half cup water, 3/4 cup flour.

I weigh my ingredients – but if you stop to think, if you start out with a quarter cup of starter and half cup water and 3/4 cup flour this morning, this evening you would be starting out with about a cup of starter, 2 cups of water and 3 cups of flour. Lots of starter. Do that a couple of days and I believe someone said you would have enough starter to fill a swimming pool.
I have a detailed reviving/feeding instruction sheet that I will be happy to send you. Don’t want to hog Eric’s site.

I agree, Eric.

AND, I am of the school of not using tap water for my starters. I use filtered water (not bottled). I have found it DOES make a difference with MY rural water. It doesn’t seem to affect the dough as much as it does the starter.

I use nothing but white flour in my starters. If I am doing a WW or Rye, then I substitute up to 50 cent of the desired flour for the white. I have yet to get a great totally WW or Rye bread.

Hup, 1-2-3! Hup, 1-2-3!

That’s why you START with small amounts and only SAVE a small amount.

Discard the excess for two or three days – it won’t be strong enough to rise your dough – and I think that is your problem. You are expecting too much of the young baby.

Just remember, depending on the starter, it may take up to 7 days to get a good, viable starter.

I have revived some that took two weeks and other just 2 or 3 days.

On the side of your starter container, mark the top of the starter. You can use a magic marker or even slip a rubber band around the jar. You want to use that mark as a base.
When the starter rises, you will see a residue left where it rose. Now you can tell if you are getting a doubling or quadrupling of the starter. I look at mine every time I walk by it.
Take another look at that jar of starter posted on this site. It is perfect!

Try this:

Cover your dough and put it in the refrigerator overnight and then bake it. That sometimes increases the “strength” of the flavor.

That said, I have some starters that are very mild and I have had them for well over a year. Others I have are too strong from MY taste.

These starters came to me from all over, but are fed with generic all purpose flour and filtered water. Each is fed the exact same proportions.

I have a friend who uses only a quarter cup of starter whereas I use a cup. Her thinking is that the smaller amount of starter takes a longer time to ferment the dough, therefore increasing the flavor.

You might want to try that method, or a combination of the two.

Bob

Thanks Bob and Eric

I tried using the starter both tired and fed without much difference. I will try a full cup and see what happens.

Do you mean to keep the dough and extra night in the fridge, or just to slow down the 12 hrs ferment in cooler temps? I often have to put the dough in the oven with the light on the last 6 hrs or so to boost it before baking because the room temp is cool in this climate. I wonder if this could be why my yeasted bread tastes slightly sour? Aha!

My husband actually doesn’t care for sourdough in general, but likes this bread as it tastes pretty close to yeasted recipe. I guess that’s a compromise we can live with…

Once I got my starter established per Eric’s pineapple method I got lazy about sending for the Oregon Trail starter. Now I am definitely going to send for it and am considering making a starter when I go to visit family out of state. Is there such a thing as NK OCD?

I’m doing exactly what you told me to do about the 1,2,3 tablespoons, feeding it twice a day (about 9 or 10 in the morning and again about 9 or 10 at night), have been doing it since last Thurs. evening (about 4-1/2 days). I’ve been leaving it out on the counter, though….should I have been putting it in the refrigerator after feeding? I put it in the fridge last night after I fed it, and this morning it still looks nice and thick and doesn’t have that watery look like it’s been having in the mornings, and it doesn’t smell like acetone. I guess it was getting hungry before morning? It has bubbles on the top but none on the sides. I’m kind of afraid to keep feeding it, though, because if it’s going to keep reverting to acetone, I don’t want to waste any more flour on it. I really think my “reserve” is doing better than this one, and that I might as well be working on it instead of this one. I still haven’t found time to look up the way to “test” a starter to see if it’s ready to make bread rise, though.

The reserved starter I got the tablespoon from was just made with flour and water. I got the proportions from somewhere else, before I discovered Breadtopia. The proportions were 2 cups flour (unbleached all-purpose) and 1-1/2 cups water (bottled spring water). Every time I’ve started one (3 times now!) it has started bubbling nicely in just a few hours, and this last one, I think I put it in the fridge after about 3 or 4 days, thinking it was done, then fed once a week. I can see, though, that it has really “matured” in the past 3 or 4 days, because I can now see bubbles through the sides of the container, whereas I couldn’t before.

I thank you guys for trying to help me. I know you’re probably getting tired of plowing through my “wordy” posts….that’s me, wordy. I even talk like that, because I have so many thoughts come to my mind and I try to get them all out at once before I forget them, which is a real possibility since I hit, um, middle age. I’m going to give it all a rest for a few days and get outside in this beautiful weather and clean up around the yard a bit!

Hello Eric,
I think you have done a wonderful job promoting the skill and satisfaction of home baked bread. Debra Wink’s contribution is appreciated also as it has saved many, many hours from nursing a false start. The pineapple juice was a terrific idea.
I suspect far more care is given to starters than is really required. The primary starter I use, I began in 1966 using bread flour and potato water. After it was flourishing, I have only fed it a few times a year, usually, Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas when I bake for family gatherings. Several times it has turned black, but a little vinegar has always taken care of that problem. It is really not “sour”, but that problem is overcome by making a sponge several days before I bake.
Keep up the good work,
Harry

What’s first is first, your site is magnificent, and is made by some one who have passion for baking to people who like to bake, for that I thank you.
I started a yeast culture 60 hours ago and now its going well, I fed it as in stage 3 I’ll give it one more day before I start adding more flour, I used all purpose unbleached, I will keep you guys informed by next Tuesday I’ll try to use it and this will be the real test for the characteristics of this strain.

This method worked great for me. Question – should you store it in the fridge? How do you know if it has gone bad?
Heather

Hi Eric – fantastic site! Thanks! Started the pineapple starter for the first time yesterday. Wondering if you, Reinhardt, or anyone have done a time-test to see if you “reduce by half, feed a half”, or just feed the starter say after every 12 hours, or 24 hours, if it would speed things up.

I’m happy to try some tests – it’s summer here and perhaps in warm weather you could get a starter qucker by not waiting 48 hours at first – but perhaps this has been tried already and it doesn’t make a difference.

Hi,

My Name is Eden. I am 10 years old. I am trying to make a sourdough starter with spelt flour. I am on the second day and just gave it the second offering of pineapple juice and flour. I am doing it in a hemp hearts container and it is working! (and hard to stir) I will let you know if it works.

Thanks for the recipe!

I tried the pineapple starter with and without a red grape immersed in it – both work but the one with the red grape was a lot bubblier by Day 3.

Will be interesting to see (any) difference in the actual bread once it’s made. Is it wise to introduce what may be “brewers yeast” into bread baking??

Good Afternoon Eric,

Back in August I followed your video recipe for making starter and I had activity after only 36 hours. The first couple of loaves I made were wonderful, but then the activity of the starter seemed to lessen. I stayed with weekly feedings of about a cup of white flour and the same of tap water. The last two attempts at bread were very disappointing in that the dough did not rise sufficiently after even two hours at about 85 degrees.

I pulled the starter from the fridge and left it at room temperature. I gave it daily feedings for three days, using only bottled water, and mixing with wood or plastic utensils, no metal. There was only minimal activity and never a “bloom” or noticeable temporary expansion of the starter. I threw it out and I am starting over.

Any suggestions of what to watch for, or improve upon, this next time?

Thanks,
Kevin

Hi! This is Eden. It worked!! I am going to make bread this afternoon. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

After 24 hrs. from step 2, I proceeded to step 3 nothing much happening after step 2, within an hour to an hour and a half bubbles busy at work. By the way , should you stir your starter after it is going if so how often? Will look to find a good basic white bread sourdough recipe on your site.
Danny

Thought I’d try using stone ground rye flour with the pineapple juice to make my sour dough starter and here it is after 5 days and nothing is happening – anyone have any thoughts? Should I just hang in there or start over again?

I aparrantly killed my white flour starter that was doing great by using regular flour or the wrong water. The wheat starter is still doing fine, and am attemting to change to white by slowly feeding it with white.

looking for a real sour sourdough starter that makes wonderful sourdough breads and biscuits? well, you’ve found one! came across this while web surffing some weeks back, have used it several times already. it may cost a few pennies more to get up and running, and a hair more to feed, but the results are great. note: i’ve used “CHOBANI” yogurt & regular buttermilk to get this starter going, and regular milk & white flour afterwords for normal feedings.

Recipes : Breads : Sourdough Bread Recipes : “Foolproof” Sourdough Starter

* Exported from MasterCook *

“FOOLPROOF” SOURDOUGH STARTER

Recipe By :
Serving Size : 999 Preparation Time :0:00
Categories : Breads

Amount Measure Ingredient — Preparation Method
——– ———— ——————————–
1 c Yogurt
1 c Milk
-skim, reg or buttermilk
1 c Flour

Mix the milk and yogurt together in a glass, pottery
or plastic container.(NOT metal) Keep a lid on it, but
don’t seal it. (sealed starters have been known to
explode!) Put this where the temperature will be
80-90F for about 24 hours. Then add the flour and put
it back in the warm place for 3-5 days. Stir it daily.
It will bubble and have the odor of fermentation. It’s
ready to use.

A starter is a live thing and must be fed. When you
use it you should replace what you used. The amount
you should replace will vary according to need. If you
use your starter often or you know you are going to
have a heavy demand soon, then you can put several
cups of milk and flour (equal measures) in it.
Generally though you should put in either 1/2 C to 1 C
of both flour and milk. I prefer to use buttermilk,
as it gives the starter a much stronger sour taste.
If you are not going to use the starter for awhile,
place it in the refrigerator. It needs to be fed once
a week…just a few spoons flour or milk. If you
forget and leave it in there for a long time without
food, don’t just throw it out. Try first to bring it
back by adding 1/2c of flour and milk and leave out
for a day or so. It is remarkable how these things
come back.

– - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – -

Copyright ©1995-2000 SOAR. ©2001-2008 RecipeSource. All Rights Reserved.
All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Hi Eric,

I am Edens mama. Eden ended up sick with a nasty cold and so I continued her sourdough adventure. The starter she made is beautiful….very lively. She wanted to try the no-need method but we needed to do some improvising as we had neither a le cloche or dutch oven. The proofing of the dough went smoothly. We used spelt flour in place of the whole wheat. When it came time to preheat the oven I put our cast iron fry pan in with a bowl of water beside to provide the desired humidity. While I’m sure the effect was no quite what it would have been with a le cloche, our bread was wonderful!! It had a lovely crisp/chewy crust and a hole filled, soft and fabulously sour crumb. All in all this is a recipe/method we will use again. (until the day when a le cloche finds its way to our home)
Thanks for the fantastic recipes/videos. Eden and I really enjoyed them! (as did the rest of our family…the bread was gone in one sitting!)

~Jennifer

Jennifer and Eden,

Congratulations on Eden’s spelt starter. Isn’t this fun?

When I am at home, I use a cast iron Dutch oven or a homemade cloche I made from a new flowerpot and tray to bake my no knead bread. But, when visiting friends and relatives, I have successfully used all kinds of covered, oven-safe pots–whatever they had on hand. You might want to try that with one of your future loaves, and see whether there is any difference between that and your iron skillet/bowl of water approach.

Hi Eric,

This is my first attempt at making bread from a starter. And I have to say, I’m very excited. I made my starter yesterday, and so far, no signs of life yet. I was wondering, though, should I do anything different if I’m baking this at high altitude? I live in Denver.

Hey Bob, for what it’s worth–I’ve had good luck making sourdough using a very ad hoc recipe. After reading the info. on this site I realized that all I needed was food for the yeastie beasties and something to tilt the ph in their favor. It was my personal theory that if I wanted to catch yeastie beasties that would grow in my kitchen I should use ingredients commonly found in my kitchen. So I used freshly ground white wheat flour (I bake a lot), a little yogurt (we always have some around), and purified water. For the first feeding I did use a little more yogurt with the flour and water, but after that I just used flour and water. I feed it about every twelve hours–every six on baking day. For whatever reason, this has been a particularly vigorous starter & has worked well for a 100% whole wheat loaf. (As to kitchen temp., mine varies a lot. I’m in Iowa and we heat primarily with wood.)

Sure Dave,
I was looking for a recipe that would be sour dough, 100% whole grain, and easy enough to make several times a week. This is what I came up with. It’s a work in progress so if you improve on it, please let me know!

2 full cups whole white wheat berries ground to flour
(I think it makes just about 3 c. of flour if you let it stay “fluffed”)
1 1/4 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. sucanat
1/4 c. starter and water to 1 1/2 c.
1 Tbsp. butter

Combine flour, salt and sucanat. Pour combined starter and water into the flour mixture & stir it into a very soft dough. Cover the bowl loosely by making a plastic bag bubble over it. Let it set overnight until *almost* double in bulk.
Melt butter in a loaf pan. (Mine are 4.5″ X 8.5″ pyrex & say they hold 1.5 qts.) Swirl the butter around the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Cut a rectangle of parchment paper to fit the bottom. Place the paper in the butter to coat it and then flip it over so your dough can sit surrounded by butter.
Scrape the dough off the sides of the bowl. Oil your hands and form the dough into a loose, sloppy loaf-like shape. It won’t keep its shape, but will ooze out to touch the edges of the pan. (My dough fills the pan nearly half high.) Cut a deep gash down the middle of the loaf, from stem to stern. Cover again and let it rise until *almost* double in bulk. My loaf is just about at the top of the pan in about 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
Bake in a preheated 350 oven for about 45 min.
When loaf is nicely brown and has pulled away from the sides of the pan it is done. Let it set in the pan for a few minutes. Rub a little butter over the top crust to make it a pretty golden brown. Then turn the loaf out onto a rack to cool.
It makes a very sliceable loaf, moist, with a nice sourdough flavor, that tastes fabulous with butter and honey or with cheese. The crumb structure, of course, is not anywhere near as open as the original nkb. It looks more like the crumb of the holy grail bread recipe on this site. Let me know if it works for you!

I have been making for years….the first 10 or 15 years , with no additional yeast. Then I started to get lazy, and , to speed things along, I started to use a little yeast. THEN nothing seemed to work!! The bread wasn’t rising the way it should. I wonder what happened?? Now I have been just using a biga for a better texture and enjoying my bread again.
Any suggestions? Marge

So, I checked my starter this morning and I don’t know if it was a successful attempt. I started it about 4 or 5 days ago. I’ve been keeping up with feeding and stirring, but I don’t see any “froth”. It smells yeasty and maybe even slightly alcoholic. There’s some bubbles in it, but I think it’s from when I stir it. Can anyone tell me if I’ve made sourdough starter or should I toss it and start from scratch?

I started this several days ago using some Langers “100% pinneapple juice…from concentrate” and everything was going great; by day three, the yeast was highly active, with the starter mix having a very wet, porous and spongy texture. On day four, I had fed it with 5.25tbsp of flour and 3tbsp of purified tap water from my Brita pitcher. Everything seemed to be doing OK, but after 24 hours, my starter seems stagnant, with sitting liquid on top and the flour mix on the bottom…just a few frothy bubbles left on top. I’m afraid that I killed my starter and Los Angeles city tap had more chlorine than my Brita could handle. The mixture still smelled very yeasty, so I fed it again today to see if it really was the filtered tap that killed it…crossing fingers that it can be salvaged and I can bake some sourdough just in time for New Years.

Great site Eric! Ever thought of making your videos downloadable podcasts? I think it would be very popular and the portable format would be very useful for us amateur bakers to have on hand (literally), particularly for the more complex recipes.

It look like my second attempt has failed too. I used Dole 100% pineapple juice from a 6oz can and white bread flour. I am 4 days in and the juice and flour are separated each time I prepare to stir it. I should be adding the 5 tbsp of flour and the water tonight. I am going to go to the next step to see what happens before I bail out…..any advise as to why this has now failed twice?

Well, the mystery of science has again wowed me again. I came home from work tonight and my starter looked great….frothy, many bubbles. I added the 42.5 grams of water and flour and it is already, 3 hours later, starting to rise. With luck I will have my first sourdough NK this weekend.

made the pineapple juice and wwflour starter followed instructions to second step put it in heated closet for three days nothing happened made a second batch kept the first 2 days later both are working good will finish making both very lively hope they stay that way .

I am also a pizza fan and googled Pete Varasano and came up with nothing. Am I missing something?

This is in response to Nick’s post about sourness. I’m not a microbiologist or a food scientist, so what I know comes from other people’s knowledge. That said, most of the artisan bakers I know would disagree with your assertions, as would, I think, the one microbiologist I know.
First off, sourness is not created by the yeast, but by the bacteria in the culture. Second, type of flour does affect sourness: rye flour will lend a more sour flavor to a sourdough culture. So will letting it ferment for longer between feedings. Finally, every source I have on the subject, for example Jeffrey Hamelman’s Bread book, tells us that it doesn’t matter where your sourdough came from, it will in time turn into a culture unique to where you keep it and feed it, i.e. where you live.
That’s why Hamelman calls his sourdough Vermont Sourdough: that’s where he lives. Buying a San Francisco sourdough culture doesn’t mean you can make genuine SF sourdough, at least not after a couple of months of feeding and using your culture.
My hope also is to clarify.

Soundman,

It looks like we were both typing at the same time, and about the same thing, although you said it better.

About whether a culture will change to a local one, or will remain stable, though, I have not been able to track that one down to any scientific evidence. The bakers I have read so far come down firmly on both sides of the question. I wonder whether Debra Wink would tackle that one?

WOW. LOOK WHAT I HAVE CREATED. I tired of waiting for the starter to start so started on a no knead basic, and baked the litte beauty in my casserole. It browned, it smelled right, like a loaf of bread should, and it was ready to be eaten!!

but it was stuck in the casserole.

but we got it out and we ate it and it was delicious like my dreams of my bread would be and it filled me with joy. I would say a tad salty but that may have been my measuring. And oh, but what a crust. what an incrdible crust.
THANKS BREATOPIA FELLOWS!!

I actually tried this with regular bread flour and it seems to have worked out just fine.

Eric,
I had no difficulty creating a starter after coaching from your video. I immediately (right after a trip to purchase Mario Batali’s 6qt. cast iron cookware from Sur La Table) made a boule, again using your video as my guide. Success! Beautiful caramelization, great aroma and tang, and it sang to me! Flushed with success, I am on a roll and have 3 loaves under production, all variations to the NK recipe. All my starter discards made the most incredible waffles (and I didn’t care much for waffles before) with Capt. John’s same day waffle formula. Wow! After all these newfound skills, I just feel like I’ve been handed an unexpected inheritance.

One tip to prevent burned bottoms: I placed my subsequent loaf on a riser about 1/2 inch off the cookware, and lowered the initial baking temp from 500 to 490F. BTW, I also tried to use those portable convection ovens, but I didn’t get much oven spring and I had to invert the bread the last 15 minutes because the bottom (bread was on a riser) was pale and uncooked.

I followed the directions and have a wonderful healthy looking starter. In the past I made homemade wine (different house and years ago). I’m thinking my culture smells very “winey” like I remember it and not so much bready. Will this change over time? I can’t imagine anything baked with this will taste very good.

Thanks!

April,
The riser I was referring to is a sort of trivet that came with my portable convection oven, where it is used to keep the food item off the floor of the oven to prevent burning. In my case, I put this riser in with my cast iron pan right from the preheat period and then I just lower my parchmented dough in for the baking. I don’t know if these can be purchased separately, but any item that serves this purpose will work. The objective is to avoid direct contact between the dough and the cast iron pan. Below is the recipe for the waffles that I’m sure is here somewhere among the threads.
Jon’s Same Day WAffles
Unlike other recipes where you mix milk & flour, this recipe uses 100% starter for the base of the batter. There is no need for it to be set aside to rest after mixing in the egg/sugar/salt/oil. The baking soda causes the leavening.
2 (or more) cups of starter
1 Tbs. sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp salt.
2 Tbs. veg. oil
Mix well, set aside.
From this batter, spoon out what you need for the waffle into a mixing bowl.
*Separately, In a shot glass, mix 1/8 – 1/4 teaspoon baking soda and a small amount of water, stir to dissolve the soda. Then gently fold this into the mix. It will start to become light and airy. Pour onto waffle iron (or griddle for pancakes). These will be very light.
Repeat the shot glass/soda mix for each waffle.
*Alternatively, add a little over 1/4 cup of water to 1 tsp baking soda, and use a tsp.of the solution for each cake. I probably wound up with less than 1/8 tsp for each pancake, but it was enough to get the good bubbling action.
The soda controls the lightness. If very sour, use a tad more soda. If you use too much soda the waffles will taste somewhat bitter.

Mike,

My starter also smells “winey”. That is a great description! I have to say it works beautifully but does not impart much real “sour” flavor. It suits is purpose though.

Cake Diva,
Thanks for the recipe. I do remember seeing it somewhere on this site…I will try it soon. The trivet idea is an interesting one. I have several cast iron and cast iron with enamel trivets that would probably serve the purpose, but I don’t use the parchment sling.

Hi Eric, I am new to bread baking and your website has been a huge help, especially with all of the little nuances that you don’t get in most recipes. THANKS! After 3 tries, I’ve got my own starter (the 1st time I just read the recipe and didn’t watch the video and I smothered it — that’s what I mean by nuances; the 2d time I tried the Joy of cooking dough method and utterly failed). I am looking forward to baking my first loaves later today, 1 rye and 1 spelt, for a dinner party on Saturday (don’t worry, I have a back-up plan). Now that I’ve got a great looking starter, my question is, at what point do I refrigerate it? If I’m going to keep baking once or twice a week, do I just keep feeding it and leave it at room temp? I’ve watched the managing your starter video but didn’t quite get that part. Thanks again for this site!

Terry,
I found this starter that sounds kind of like your grandmother-in-law’s.
Hope its useful.

Amy,

I’ve been trying to learn everything I can about sourdough, since getting my own starter going a few months ago. This is a great site for that, as is thefreshloaf.com, and Mike Avery’s sourdoughhome.com.

Most of the experts say you should maintain your starter at room temperature for at least a month. They say it takes that long for the microorganisms to stabilize. So, when I read that in more than one authoritative place, I took mine out of the fridge for several weeks.

David,

Take a look at this post for a couple of containers I use:
http://www.breadtopia.com/sourdough-no-knead-method/#comment-31953

Thanks for the tip Dave. I took mine out of the fridge and will read up on those sites. Preety soon you’re going to have to drop “the Novice” eh?!

Found your site the other day and decided to have a crack at a sour dough plant again (tried years ago without much success).

Now have a fantastic starter after a week of temperatures over 100 F (its been 45 C plus for a week here now).

I need to try and bake with it now, but its just too hot still to put an oven on… never mind, I'll keep the starter going and see what happens.

Peter.

I read a post by someone using sprouted grains and how quickly their starter took off. This would make sense because grains that have been sprouted have already begun the process of converting starch to sugar and sugar of course is a much more available form of food for your yeast than having to go through the process of converting starch to sugar on its own. I think I am going to go see what I have in the way of sweetener.
By the way, Dextrose Glucose (corn sugar) and Maltose (malt sugar) ferment much more readily than fructose(fruit sugar) and common table sugar. Both are difficult for micro organisms to digest, although they will.
I am going to add a tablespoon of of dried malt extract (DME) and see if this doesn’t get things shaking!

It’s not sourdough bread, but I used your sourdough starter tutorial to make Ethiopian injera bread! It requires a sourdough starter to get going, and I found that you had the best detailed tutorial online for this. Here is a blog post with pictures detailing the process:

http://www.ericaustinlee.com/2009/02/my-first-home-made-ethiopian-meal/

Thanks so much for the help!

Hi Eric, For the past week I have attempted and suceeded at making sour-dough starter using your recipe! My house is staying a little on the cool side this winter so the wild yeast didn’t seem to be doing much of anything for a few days, so I placed the jar on a heating register on the floor of the house to keep it warm and, WA-LA, I got yeast action and alot of it! Smells strongly of alchohol like bourbon whiskey or something; is this normal?

Hi Jim;

I made your Pizza dough & enjoyed the recipe, thanks I used your recipe for Sourdough starter as well, and despite an error I made, it looks as though it is working! I read the directions, and still managed to skip a step-for some reason I expected activity after the first 48 hours, so I did not feed the starter as directed. I could smell yeast, though, so I decided to wait one more day since our house runs on the cool side. This morning (60 hrs later) I had lots of activity Now, my problem: I decided to skip the feeding with pineapple juice step, since I had yeast, and went right to step 3. Then realized, DUH! my proportions will be off-will this affect the final starter? Or are the proportions really just “guidelines” ?

Thanks for the great website-

Laurie

one thing I forgot to say above. My bottom crust using pyrex loaf pans came out a little too dark and crusty. Do I need to lower temperatures for altitude?

I am in Day 4 of making Sourdough Starter and no results. Our average house temperature is about 64-67F. I followed the recipe as required. I will try another day and then if no results…..start over? Any suggestions much appreciated. BTW for pineapple juice i used the juice from a fresh pineapple.

I’m new to this too, but it was mentioned that putting your starter into the oven with ONLY the oven light on can be helpful-my oven gets a bit too warm-about 85, so I had to turn it on/off to keep the temp stable, but it did help move things along, as my house is cool like yours.

Good luck!

It’s ALIVE!!! My first attempt at baking from scratch, and it was successful! Tommorow I’m going to try the sourdough no knead recipe! This website is awesome!

One thing I found, our house is quite cold, so I stuck the jar I was growing my starter in near the coffee maker. Not right up against it, but near it, and that really seemed to help.

I followed the pineapple method and it was going along so well (my starter was already bubbly) that I skipped about a day and during step 2 and just went on to step 3 to feed it. I tasted a bit of it before I fed it and it was SOUR and sharp. I fed it and while it bubbled and smells nice, it didn’t double, or get stringy.

Did I ruin my starter? Should I start over or try to save this one?

Should I feed it and stir it during those days?

My starter is alive! Today was the 5th day and even yesterday it was already quite bubbly and sour smelling. After the feeding today it has already grown quite a bit. Very exciting. Your directions worked just as I had hoped. If I refridgerate it will it still remain alive? Would I need to pull it out before I need to use to let it warm up?
I also just made the no-knead sandwich loaf and it did not seem to rise as much as I had hoped. Any suggestions? Thanks for the site, it has been the most helpful I have found. Looking forward to more!
BJ

On the contrary-

I leave my starter in the back of the fridge. I feed it when I remember which is usually right after I make bread…because I assume I’ll dilute it if I feed it immediately before tossing it in the bowl. I use it cold and hungry and have never had a problem. My hubby uses commercial yeast and bakes more often than I do lately, so I’d say the feedings are maybe every week and a half to two weeks or so. Very scientific. I weigh by scale but hubby measures by volume. Go figure.

Bob

Your not doing anything wrong!! You are just much more attentive to your starter than I am. I was simply making a point that it seems starters are pretty flexible and are even hard to kill. I’ve even tried used varying amounts of starter and seem to get the same end result. Keep doing what works for you, don’t fix what isn’t broken.

My bread is more consistent than my husbands because I weigh out the ingredients. His is sometimes wetter or denser due to the flour to water ratio. My starter has never let me down. Not yet at least!!

I would like to add for anyone who reads down this far that it if you need to pour off excess starter, why not reserve half in the fridge. That way you will have starter already innoculated and ready to be revived when you need it. Also, from home brewing I know that the really active stuff, the stuff with all the yeast, is the froth on the top. It may be to your advantage to pour this off and keep feeding it, tossing the bottom half or reserving it for later use. You will have a more active starter for your trouble!

you mention ” pure spring water”
wont tapwater work? Bottled. Perrier?
does it matter?

thanks

My tapwater instantly kills yeasts of any kind. Can’t use it in the recipes I make either if water is called for.

I keep a Brita filter pitcher of water on my counter and use the room temperature water in all my starters AND my breads. Cool/cold water slows down the action. Too hot will kill the nice little critters in your starter.

If you had kids, remember how you tested the baby bottle on your wrist? Voila!
Bob

The best sour dough starter is a tablespoon of mashed/ground currant (resins), 3 table spoon ful whole wheat flour, 1-tea spoon of sugar and enough water. Mix well and leave for 3-4 days at room temp in a bottle that has holes in the cover. The yeast comes from the resins. Bacteria comes from the air. We use the no knead technique with the sour dough culture and it turns out great. It is a two day process but the result is great! We never baked bread in our lives before and if we can do it any one can do it.
Raj,
Sweden.

Hey Eric,
WOW! just stumbled upon this website via someones comments at another great site: http://www.culinate.com (”eat your ideal”). What an incredible resource you have here! And such a service to people who love to bake. My interest has been exponential lately and I am ready for a wild starter. This has given me the little push I needed to just go for it. Thanks so much for what you have created here. I am going to share this with many dear friends.

salud! -Ian

Thanks for this video. It was very clear and easy as far a instructions go. I am keen to make my own bread as I try to avoided yeasted breads. However I am keen on bread that is not too sour. In fact I do not like the sour to be prominent at all. Does that mean I use a starter that is less mature? Any other tips. By the way, this a great site and easy to navigate. Thanks

AO, my kids also do not like any sour at all- and I mean even the tiniest hint gets them complaining. I use the herman way of feeding- equal parts milk and unbleached flour and about half of a part of sugar ( I try to go easy on the sugar). I also do not put my starter in the fridge as I heard that can make it more sour, mine lives on my counter and has for over a year now.

The way I maintain my starter is about a cup in a wooden ice bucket (I had mine branded bread starter on it) the kind with the plastic liner inside. I may neglect it for weeks, but when I know I am going to want to bake with it I feed it (which makes 2 cups), wait 12-24 hours and I feed it again(now 4 cups), wait another 12 hours or so then I use it to bake with. The frequent feedings make it as mild as it can be and raring to go. I have read that the sourness is the by products of starved yeast- by well feeding it right before several times it is gorged instead of starving. I also may add a little sugar to say biscuit recipes…only a little maybe a couple Tbl. I typically make a couple things needing in total about 3 cups of starter which again leaves me with one that I set aside and forget about for what could be weeks until the next time.

Also the kind of flour you use dictates how sour it will be to a degree. Wheat can get pretty sour and so can rye…I don’t know about rice or other types of flour. I believe that the milk also helps to give a milder flavor and the sugar helps counteract the sour.

Just my opinions and what I do, hope it helps.

I am only 36 hours into making my first ever starter. I have noticed on this most recent stir that near the top of the container where some of the mixture sticks to the sides that there is mould. I have wiped this away as it is only at the top, but wonder if it could become toxic to use or contaminate the rest of the starter. Can I still continue or is any mould and indicater that I should start again. Room temperature where I live is ranges between 19-28 degrees celsius over 24hrs and I’m not to sure if this is too warm to grow starter. Should I start again? Is this normal. Is it too warm? The container was clean (it had been through a dishwasher) and I kept it covered in the top shelf of my cupboard. Advice?

Further on from my comment above: I wiped the mould way from the top where it was evident (using clean paper/kitchen towel). Making sure I was leaving a clean dry surface so it wouldn’t come back and continued with the process. When I looked at the starter at the end of the second 48 hrs it had begun to show activity (as had hoped for) and did not smell off at all, and there was no evidence of mould. So it appears I have overcome that hurdle. I have just added the 5 and a quarter spoons of flour and 3 spoons of water (I have used bottled spring water as I didn’t have any purified on hand). I’ll see how this goes from here.

Thanks Bob, my oversite. I believe now I have a starter on the go.

I have in the last 2 hours added the last addition of flour & water and it has been transferred to a jar. The jar now has about a (large – 300ml) cup full of starter, I assume this is where I have to start maintaining it.

A query: just before I added the last amount of flour (and it had been like this over the last few days) the mixture would froth/bubble on the top then under that it was sort of liquid and then under that there is the rest of the mix. Is it normal to separate like this over the making stage between the additions of flour?

Since the final addition of flour it is like what you showed in the video. It looks good and has a strong (I suppose fermented sort of sweet-sour) smell. I have made it from white spelt. Does this mean I have to make the loaf from white spelt flour? In turn do I have to adjust my starter to the flour I am about to bake with? This is what I seem to gather from the discussions above. Or can you mix and match starters and baking flours?

It is evening my time now and wonder if I can start baking with this tomorrow (as I only need a 1/4 cup for your sourdough spelt recipe, so I already have enough)? Or do I have to continue feeding it for a bit? How soon after a feed can I use it? Should I just wait for it to double or does it need to be a least 12-24 hours?

Thanks for all the help on the videos and the feedback on the above forum

I started my sourdough starter using whole Spelt flour. It is ending the second 48 hrs and it has a layer of liquid on top (hooch?) it seems very glutenous but not a lot of bubbles. I had tried this before with the spelt flour and water and got the same thing… thinking I had some bad culture growing I tossed it and started fresh. Now I don’t know what to do next… is this how spelt starter looks?

Alex

Someone Mentioned that they started their Sour Dough starter with Spelt flour.. I don’t think the there is enough Gluten in the spelt flour to produce the same effect as white or wholewheat flour.. could someone please comment on that.. I would love to be able to start with just Spelt, because I don’t want to use white or wholewheat.. but I believe that it is not possible to use a less glutenous grain such as spelt. Please let me know what you all think.

Jeannie W.

Just a note: I was using white spelt flour, thus it probably gave me more activity when I was converting my starter. Whole spelt may be harder to get going. (Eric?)

Wil

Hi Folks,
FYI to anybody interested in how I made my sourdough starter. I am a nutritionist and eat a lot of raw foods and I noticed that everybody was using what I call “dead” pineapple juice to make their starter. What I mean by “dead” is that the juice is from a can meaning that it has been processed, heated to kill various organism etc… What happens in the canning process is that all of the enzymes, beneficial bacteria and YEAST etc that may be present are killed off. It may be safer for public consumption (a matter of opinion) but it is not as healthy when all the enzymes are killed off.

I wondered what would happen if I used juice that had all the live “critters” still kicking around? So I did a little experiment and made two starters using pineapple juice; one from fresh squeezed pineapple and the other from canned pineapple juice. I know it is only one experiment, but the difference was striking. In the fresh squeezed juice starter I had a few bubbles by the end of the first day (I have never made starter before so I simply thought that I did something wrong and attributed the bubbles to air). After 2 1/2 days (less than 72 hours) I had a full blown starter. After 3 full days It would easily double in size after each feeding. It smells and tastes stronger than the starter made from canned juice and it is still getting a bit stronger and a little “sweet” tasting if that makes any sense.

The other starter made from the canned “dead” juice is doing well after 5 days, but it does not taste as strong, sweet or “smooth” (don’t know how else to describe it) as the other. It taste “harsh” and bitter compared to the fresh juice starter. In addition, there is no question that the starter made from the fresh squeezed pineapple is significantly more vigorous than the other!

It’s just a one time experiment so take this info as you wish, but I thought maybe others might want to try this and see how it goes. I figure that the “live” juice that I used has all sorts of beneficial bacteria and apparently even some yeast that are making this starter much different than the other! My starter made from the “dead” juice is doing just fine and I would never know the difference if it were not for trying this experiment. Since it’s my first starter I don’t have much to go on, BUT like I said the starter made from the fresh juice is what I would call much better after 6 days than the other. Maybe I have some yeast from Hawaii in that pineapple juice? I don’t know if yeast can actually be inside a fruit, but my starter sure us doing well….

Going to give it a few more days and then try and make some bread with it

Mikhael

Mikhael, I agree with Jeannie W. Way to go! It reminds me of a passage in one of Peter Reinhart’s books, when a student whould raise a question regarding “what if?” I have my fresh pineapple ready to go. I may try starting it with just the scrapings left in the bottom of one of my white starters (a very good one) to give it a jump start. It wouldn’t be starting from scratch that way but do you think it will take anything away from the idea behind the pineapple theory / quality?

Wil

Hi Wil,

I don’t think using your starter will take away from the quality, but IMHO if you really want to test this out I would start totally from scratch that way you would know for certain if there is anything to this method. It sounds like you have experience with starter so I would be interested in hearing your opinion using the fresh juice. Since it was my first starter I don’t have much to go on.

Maybe you should do both, use your old starter and also start from scratch then compare them…
I have since made some bread from the starter. It does not taste very sour, it may need more time and I am a newbie at sourdough so I think I need some practice.

Mikhael

Some results are in. The pineapple starter using juice from a fresh pineapple is in the third day and I just had to go to step #3. It was really working after the 1st 48 hrs (36 really). All I can say is WOW! This starter already taste great. It is already a little power house. I thought my starter was good but I think this may beat it. The 2nd pineapple starter that had a kick start from some scrapings from a starter jar was working in just about 24 hrs and is also doing very well and has a taste like the starter from scratch. Both have a very different kind of sour taste than my regular starters. I can’t describe it other than it is sour without a tang. The starter refreshed with regular city tap water did ok and acted just like it always has. No problems, although I don’t think I will continue to use tap water. I am wondering if one was to refresh a problem starter with pineapple juice, it might fix it. Kind of like “take 2 asprins and check in the morning”. Maybe pineapple juice is starter medicine.

Wil

Eric,
I love your website! Thank you for sharing. I have recently made my own starter using the recipe here, and have made 3 loaves now of sourdough bread. While it’s getting better, I still feel like it’s a little dense. Any ideas why? Tips or pointers you can offer up? Thanks! I never want to buy bread again!

Wil,
Thanks for checking out the “pineapple theory”! Good to see that there appears to be something to this. Since I have little experience with starters I wondered if I was just getting excited about nothing, but it appears that this is a valid new method for getting a starter going…..awesome….

This method will most likely work with all sorts of “raw” fruits (even fresh acidic vegetable juices?), fresh OJ etc. and I’ll bet that each one imparts it’s own special flavor to the starter.

Mikhael

I passed the pineapples today at the grocery store and thought seriously about trying a new starter, but figured my old starter is just fine. I don’t think I will pass them over next time I am at the store. Thanks for the push, Wil.

How do you get the juice from the pineapple? A lemon reamer? I feel like a real dunce at the moment but I can’t wrap my brain around it.