Sourdough Starter Daily Feedings
Congratulations on rehydrating your sourdough starter! Use these feeding instructions to keep your starter happy and active.
Daily feedings are simple. You will need the following supplies and ingredients:
Glass jar with a lid
Basic kitchen scale
Rubber or wooden spatula
Rehydrated sourdough starter
Unbleached, all purpose or bread flour
Note: if you have a whole wheat sourdough starter, you should use whole wheat flour instead
Room temperature water (filtered or bottled)
Instructions:
Add 35 grams of starter to a clean, glass jar. We prefer a wide-mouth, quart size mason jar.
Then add 125 grams of water and 140 grams of flour.
Stir to combine then cover with a lid and store at room temperature. You do not need to completely seal the lid onto the jar, placing it gently on top is fine.
When your starter is bubbly and has at least doubled in size, it’s ready for use in baking. You can also try the “float test” by placing a spoonful of your starter in a bowl of warm water. If it floats, it is likely ready for baking.
How often should you feed your starter?
Sourdough starters are active organisms which means they need regular feedings for best results. After feeding, a mature starter will grow 3-4x in volume in a 24 hour period and then begin to fall back down. It’s best to bake with your starter when it is at its peak activity, usually within 2-12 hours of being fed.
When we are baking a lot, we feed our starter every 24 hours. If you don’t plan to bake daily, you can refrigerate your sourdough starter in an airtight jar. Cold temperatures slow yeast and bacteria activity, reducing the need for daily feedings. While storing your starter in the fridge, feed it at least 1x per week to keep it strong. If stored in the fridge for prolonged periods of time, your starter may require an additional few feeding at room temperature before it has resumed regular activity levels and is strong enough for baking.
What to do if your starter is not bubbly and rising after feeding?
If your starter isn’t active and bubbly, be patient. Try moving to a warmer area of your kitchen or place in the oven with the oven light on as the light will generate some heat. Do not turn the oven on. Sometimes the only thing a starter needs to gain strength is time. If it is sluggish, give it more time and feed daily until it is nice and bubbly. It is very difficult to kill your starter, so be patient!
What is “discard” & what to do with it:
You will discard some starter with each feeding. If you do not discard the excess starter, your starter will require larger quantities of flour and water at each feeding. For most, this would lead to an unsustainable amount of starter and a lot of waste. Once your starter is strong enough to bake with, you can store your “discard” in a glass jar in the fridge without needing to feed it and use it in sourdough discard baking recipes. There are countless recipes for utilizing sourdough discard. If you are throwing the discard away, do not put it down your sink. When the starter dries, it is like cement and will damage your drain.