> the uniqueness of your starter is defined by the local climate, local flour, and the way you feed it to keep it alive. The weather in Greece is much warmer...
I will assume most people reading this are already sourdough bakers - but if not, baking sourdough can be extraordinarily simple, easy and cheap - give it a go!
All you need to flour and water to make your starter, and a little salt for baking. I've got my (BakeWithJack style) process down to about 10 minutes (across 30mins) in the morning, 12 hours proofing, a few folds then into the fridge for 12 hours, then bake. A loaf lasts us 2 days and I can do the dough or bake while getting the kids ready for school.
My wife offered to get some sort of bread machine, but it is the process that I love as much as the bread (same as brewing beer).
I'd like to add one piece of advice that I don't see very often.
You tend to see pictures of sourdough starters in big jars. But you don't need a big jar! A tiny amount of starter is enough to get going.
Each time you feed it, the size multiplies, so you can start with a teaspoon of starter and make enough for a big loaf in just a day or two. When I'm in a bread-making routine, I keep like 10g of starter. One feed brings it up to ~50g, another feed to ~150, and that's enough for a loaf (saving 10g for next time).
If you keep your starter in a big jar, it'll just go to waste. Keep it small and you'll never need to throw any away.
On more than one occasion, I've made sourdough pancakes or something, and forgotten to save some of the starter. The tiniest scraping of uncooked batter from a leftover spoon is enough to keep it going -- just mix it with flour and water and the magic happens.
Totally this! I was using huge jars when I first started and making massive levain - now just 10g in a jar, 50g water and flour as you say and it is good to go.
> If you keep your starter in a big jar, it'll just go to waste. Keep it small and you'll never need to throw any away.
I tend to make «sourdough discard crackers» if I have leftovers. It works well timing wise, I'm in the kitchen doing the initial stretching of my loaf anyways.
Agreed - though before I baked I thought sourdough was complex process that likely needed stuff I didn't have to hand, and assuming getting a starter would require and Etsy order.
I bake 'normal' bread on occasion but since we all prefer sourdough and it costs so much in the shops for good sourdough, it is my go to.
If you don't like sourdough, you don't need to make sourdough!
Use baker's yeast instead. That doesn't limit you to basic recipes -- there's a vast range of interesting stuff you can bake. You'll usually need to make a preferment with flour, water and yeast (a "poolish" or "biga") so the overall routine is very similar to sourdough.
You don't have to make bread. My current favorite thing is sourdough English muffins, but King Arthur has a whole list of recipes that use the sourdough discard. The sourdough pancakes are excellent, especially after you drown them in maple syrup.
It's the resource I shared the most with friends who asked me how to bake sourdough breads, even though I didn't learn the basics from it I really like his style of teaching, concise and thorough at the same time.
The worked up my own process below through seeing what worked for my flour and starter:
100g sourdough starter
300g water (cold and filtered)
12g fine sea salt
10g olive oil
550g white and brown bread flour mixed (I use 200g brown, 350g white)
Morning of the day before (24 hours), or on the night before (12hours) you will bake:
Feed the sourdough starter 50g brown bread flour and 50g water. Make sure that this is at least 12 hours before you plan to make the dough, allowing time to double in size and form a very bubbly starter before using.
Morning:
Measure 100g of bubbling sourdough starter into a bowl, add 300g cold water and whisk with a fork for 1min. Add 12g salt and whisk briefly again until the salt is dissolved.
Add 10g olive oil and 550g flour and stir until all flour is mixed in, at least 2 mins of mixing. Use your (wet) hand to complete the mix.
Leave for at least 5 minutes then gently lift and fold one corner of the dough into the middle, rotate the bowl 1/4 and repeat. Fold the dough 4 times then cover and leave for 15 mins and repeat the folding, before one final folding 15 mins later, before leaving to proof for the rest of the day.
Proofing:
Cover the dough, let it proof (rise) for 10-12 hours at 16-19c in the kitchen. It only needs to double in size - you don't want it to over proof.
That evening:
Shape. Check your dough, and when it has almost doubled in size, it is ready to stretch, fold, and shape.
Wet your hands, and bring the dough in from the corners of the bowl, then reach in from each side and lift up the dough in the middle, letting it stretch down front and back. Let it stretch for 15 seconds, then fold these two dropping sides over itself, turn the bowl and repeat until folded this way 4 times.
Shape roughly into the loaf you want, onto a lightly floured parchment-lined bowl - if your shaping has formed a seam, put the seam side up and pinch it closed. Cover and this in the fridge overnight.
The next morning preheat the oven to 225c - if you have a cast iron pot add this to the oven to pre heat with the lid off.
Remove the proofed loaf from the fridge, and add any cuts or slashes to the loaf before baking.
Place the loaf (still on the parchment paper) into the cast iron pot, cover and bake for 20-25. Remove lid, and bake 10-15 more minutes, until very deeply golden. For my oven total baking time is 35 mins, 25 covered and 10 uncovered.
Remove from the over and the pan, then remove the parchment paper. Let it cool on a rack for at least an hour before cutting.
If you don't have a cast iron pot you can bake in two roasting trays placed face to face, or you can bake just on a baking tray, uncovered - if so add a small pour (20ml) of boiling water to the base of your oven, every 10 mins for the first 20 mins (at start, at 10mins,and at 20mins).
I must say that making my own starter, and making pizza from this.. incredible. It has been a very fun and fulfilling journey. It is better than going out for me and I now have it dialed in to where I can crank out 12 pizza in an hour from my oven. We have friends over and it’s a great time. The dough I feel like is also well adapted and suited to my particular environment and the flour I bake with and there is something unique in that this culture you can only get from me and my house
Yeah, the sourdough my wife and I bake now is so fine-tuned that we haven't had better sourdough from anywhere. Indeed the sourdough pizza is insanely good! We make crackers, pancakes and waffles with the discard. Oh and chocolate chip cookies... freakin' glorious.
We did the Tour du Mont Blanc hike (170km/105mi) last summer over 8 days, and we took one of our sourdough starters to let it take in the different particulates in the air all over the alps. Whether it makes a big difference or not is hard to say, but it was a fun way to hopefully bolster the "diversity" of the starter's makeup. It is indeed a very strong starter that we get great results from. I would have been really curious to submit it to this study, had I the chance, because we've taken it all over the place now!
> I wonder what might happen if I was to feed it twice a day at room temperature for a month or so.
If that S. cerevisiae is from accidental contamination from commercial yeast, it'll probably stay dominant. Commercial yeast is a bit of an overachiever.
Temperature matters though. You only really see San Francisco style sourdough cultures, with L. sanfranciscensis cooccuring with K. humilis yeast, in bakeries that regularly backslop at room temperature and never use commercial yeast. That's not easy for most home bakers.
In the first image ("How old is [Stinkie] compared to the other mumble mumble* starters?"), the cumulative age distribution mostly falls off as you might expect, but it looks like there's a very noticeable bump about 4-5 years ago. I guess people in Europe were making pandemic bread too.
How's that for a startup idea: 23andMe, but for yeast. So 16andMe I guess.
Seriously though, I love stuff like this, and wish biotechnology services were more accessible for regular people. Probably not much of a market, though!
As far as the starter and discard, they are "twins". You can divide them into even smaller lots and have quadruplets, octuplets or whatever. Adopt them out and everybody's happy.
> reverse is true for that twin in Finland where rye is more predominant than wheat
Calling yield of 26 mtons predominant over 869 mtons[1] seems like an exaggeration and maybe barley was meant instead of rye? Or I'm misinterpreting something.
Knowing Finns, I'd wager that they mean rye flour is used more for bread than wheat flour. They're not talking about general production of flour, but usage in bread.
> the uniqueness of your starter is defined by the local climate, local flour, and the way you feed it to keep it alive. The weather in Greece is much warmer...
There's actually a word for this: terroir - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terroir
I will assume most people reading this are already sourdough bakers - but if not, baking sourdough can be extraordinarily simple, easy and cheap - give it a go!
All you need to flour and water to make your starter, and a little salt for baking. I've got my (BakeWithJack style) process down to about 10 minutes (across 30mins) in the morning, 12 hours proofing, a few folds then into the fridge for 12 hours, then bake. A loaf lasts us 2 days and I can do the dough or bake while getting the kids ready for school.
My wife offered to get some sort of bread machine, but it is the process that I love as much as the bread (same as brewing beer).
This guy made baking really simple for me https://www.bakewithjack.co.uk/videos
I'd like to add one piece of advice that I don't see very often.
You tend to see pictures of sourdough starters in big jars. But you don't need a big jar! A tiny amount of starter is enough to get going.
Each time you feed it, the size multiplies, so you can start with a teaspoon of starter and make enough for a big loaf in just a day or two. When I'm in a bread-making routine, I keep like 10g of starter. One feed brings it up to ~50g, another feed to ~150, and that's enough for a loaf (saving 10g for next time).
If you keep your starter in a big jar, it'll just go to waste. Keep it small and you'll never need to throw any away.
On more than one occasion, I've made sourdough pancakes or something, and forgotten to save some of the starter. The tiniest scraping of uncooked batter from a leftover spoon is enough to keep it going -- just mix it with flour and water and the magic happens.
Totally this! I was using huge jars when I first started and making massive levain - now just 10g in a jar, 50g water and flour as you say and it is good to go.
> If you keep your starter in a big jar, it'll just go to waste. Keep it small and you'll never need to throw any away.
I tend to make «sourdough discard crackers» if I have leftovers. It works well timing wise, I'm in the kitchen doing the initial stretching of my loaf anyways.
Yeah I just use a wide mouth pint jar. Stays in the fridge until I feel like making something with the starter.
It’s not really substantially different priced than yeast based bread baking
Agreed - though before I baked I thought sourdough was complex process that likely needed stuff I didn't have to hand, and assuming getting a starter would require and Etsy order.
I bake 'normal' bread on occasion but since we all prefer sourdough and it costs so much in the shops for good sourdough, it is my go to.
I just wish there was a way to make it taste less ... sour.
If you don't like sourdough, you don't need to make sourdough!
Use baker's yeast instead. That doesn't limit you to basic recipes -- there's a vast range of interesting stuff you can bake. You'll usually need to make a preferment with flour, water and yeast (a "poolish" or "biga") so the overall routine is very similar to sourdough.
Get a bread machine if you don't like the sour taste.
Or bake a basic no-knead loaf. I would mix the dough in the morning and bake it in the evening.
Proof then bake soon after - I find the sour flavour develops more the longer I leave it to rest in the fridge.
You don't have to make bread. My current favorite thing is sourdough English muffins, but King Arthur has a whole list of recipes that use the sourdough discard. The sourdough pancakes are excellent, especially after you drown them in maple syrup.
Thanks for the link. It has hundreds of videos though. Any specific videos you’d recommend to get started and to fine tune it?
As an alternative, I can recommend Hendrik's "The Bread Code": https://www.the-bread-code.io/
He has a very simple beginner's recipe on his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msqU-ylXWUs
It's the resource I shared the most with friends who asked me how to bake sourdough breads, even though I didn't learn the basics from it I really like his style of teaching, concise and thorough at the same time.
Hey,
Try this series from him that is a great intro: https://youtu.be/vmb0wWKITBQ?si=S3MVF8qyKLOuCHmq
I was then inspired by https://youtu.be/ZxCf39G_7pY?si=Mf5dfcZIngyXCuEY
The worked up my own process below through seeing what worked for my flour and starter:
100g sourdough starter 300g water (cold and filtered) 12g fine sea salt 10g olive oil 550g white and brown bread flour mixed (I use 200g brown, 350g white)
Morning of the day before (24 hours), or on the night before (12hours) you will bake: Feed the sourdough starter 50g brown bread flour and 50g water. Make sure that this is at least 12 hours before you plan to make the dough, allowing time to double in size and form a very bubbly starter before using.
Morning: Measure 100g of bubbling sourdough starter into a bowl, add 300g cold water and whisk with a fork for 1min. Add 12g salt and whisk briefly again until the salt is dissolved. Add 10g olive oil and 550g flour and stir until all flour is mixed in, at least 2 mins of mixing. Use your (wet) hand to complete the mix. Leave for at least 5 minutes then gently lift and fold one corner of the dough into the middle, rotate the bowl 1/4 and repeat. Fold the dough 4 times then cover and leave for 15 mins and repeat the folding, before one final folding 15 mins later, before leaving to proof for the rest of the day.
Proofing: Cover the dough, let it proof (rise) for 10-12 hours at 16-19c in the kitchen. It only needs to double in size - you don't want it to over proof.
That evening: Shape. Check your dough, and when it has almost doubled in size, it is ready to stretch, fold, and shape.
Wet your hands, and bring the dough in from the corners of the bowl, then reach in from each side and lift up the dough in the middle, letting it stretch down front and back. Let it stretch for 15 seconds, then fold these two dropping sides over itself, turn the bowl and repeat until folded this way 4 times.
Shape roughly into the loaf you want, onto a lightly floured parchment-lined bowl - if your shaping has formed a seam, put the seam side up and pinch it closed. Cover and this in the fridge overnight.
The next morning preheat the oven to 225c - if you have a cast iron pot add this to the oven to pre heat with the lid off.
Remove the proofed loaf from the fridge, and add any cuts or slashes to the loaf before baking.
Place the loaf (still on the parchment paper) into the cast iron pot, cover and bake for 20-25. Remove lid, and bake 10-15 more minutes, until very deeply golden. For my oven total baking time is 35 mins, 25 covered and 10 uncovered.
Remove from the over and the pan, then remove the parchment paper. Let it cool on a rack for at least an hour before cutting.
If you don't have a cast iron pot you can bake in two roasting trays placed face to face, or you can bake just on a baking tray, uncovered - if so add a small pour (20ml) of boiling water to the base of your oven, every 10 mins for the first 20 mins (at start, at 10mins,and at 20mins).
Iterated from these instructions (with videos of the folds) https://www.feastingathome.com/sourdough-bread/#tasty-recipe...
I must say that making my own starter, and making pizza from this.. incredible. It has been a very fun and fulfilling journey. It is better than going out for me and I now have it dialed in to where I can crank out 12 pizza in an hour from my oven. We have friends over and it’s a great time. The dough I feel like is also well adapted and suited to my particular environment and the flour I bake with and there is something unique in that this culture you can only get from me and my house
Yeah, the sourdough my wife and I bake now is so fine-tuned that we haven't had better sourdough from anywhere. Indeed the sourdough pizza is insanely good! We make crackers, pancakes and waffles with the discard. Oh and chocolate chip cookies... freakin' glorious.
We did the Tour du Mont Blanc hike (170km/105mi) last summer over 8 days, and we took one of our sourdough starters to let it take in the different particulates in the air all over the alps. Whether it makes a big difference or not is hard to say, but it was a fun way to hopefully bolster the "diversity" of the starter's makeup. It is indeed a very strong starter that we get great results from. I would have been really curious to submit it to this study, had I the chance, because we've taken it all over the place now!
> I wonder what might happen if I was to feed it twice a day at room temperature for a month or so.
If that S. cerevisiae is from accidental contamination from commercial yeast, it'll probably stay dominant. Commercial yeast is a bit of an overachiever.
Temperature matters though. You only really see San Francisco style sourdough cultures, with L. sanfranciscensis cooccuring with K. humilis yeast, in bakeries that regularly backslop at room temperature and never use commercial yeast. That's not easy for most home bakers.
In the first image ("How old is [Stinkie] compared to the other mumble mumble* starters?"), the cumulative age distribution mostly falls off as you might expect, but it looks like there's a very noticeable bump about 4-5 years ago. I guess people in Europe were making pandemic bread too.
* I can't read Dutch
How's that for a startup idea: 23andMe, but for yeast. So 16andMe I guess.
Seriously though, I love stuff like this, and wish biotechnology services were more accessible for regular people. Probably not much of a market, though!
As far as the starter and discard, they are "twins". You can divide them into even smaller lots and have quadruplets, octuplets or whatever. Adopt them out and everybody's happy.
This caught my eye:
> reverse is true for that twin in Finland where rye is more predominant than wheat
Calling yield of 26 mtons predominant over 869 mtons[1] seems like an exaggeration and maybe barley was meant instead of rye? Or I'm misinterpreting something.
[1] https://vyr.fi/app/uploads/2024/01/inengl_1ca381b_Production...
Knowing Finns, I'd wager that they mean rye flour is used more for bread than wheat flour. They're not talking about general production of flour, but usage in bread.
Ah, that would make more sense. But even so, wheat seems to be three times more popular than rye: https://ruokatieto.fi/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Tietohaaruk...
Calling Romania Greece is US levels of geographical ignorance. Impressive.
> The graph shows five different vertical bars
Actually 6
"Five different bars containing unique combinations of typical sourdough classes, with the sixth bar being the combination of your own starter."
This is a brilliant company idea! So happy it exists.