How to make Sourdough Starter (For Beginners) (2024)

Learn how to make a sourdough starter from scratch. I will guide you step by step through the process with lots of useful tips, a photo diary, and a video. It's an easy-to-understand guide and suitable for beginners who can't wait to bake beautiful and delicious loaves of bread, sandwich, pizza crust, and brioche. All you need is flour, water, and time.

Note: Please understand that I can only give an orientation of what I've learned from experience and tests. Every sourdough starter behaves differently. So, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Activity and growth depend on many different factors, and you need to figure out what works for you in your environment with the flour and water you are using. It may be possible that my outlined feeding schedule doesn't suit your starter well. It's best to watch your starter and adjust the feedings accordingly.

Ingredients notes

1. Flour - I highly recommend using organic white bread flour when possible. A strong bread flour contributes a lot to growing a healthy and strong sourdough starter that is reliable. However, any grain-based gluten flour will work, such as rye, einkorn, spelt, whole wheat, or all-purpose white flour. It may take a little longer to have a reliable starter, and the activity of your starter with such flours can fluctuate a lot. No matter which flour you choose, be sure to use organic flour, as the chemical traces in non-organic flours can interfere with the healthy growth of the wild yeast cultures. You don't need to stick to one flour forever. Once you have a healthy and active starter, you can switch flours anytime.
2. Water - Use only filtered or bottled water. The chlorine in tap water greatly reduces and disrupts the activity of the wild yeast cultures and can cause your starter to die.

Recommended equipment

• Kitchen scale - I recommend investing in a kitchen scale as working with cups is not accurate. A gram or an ounce is always a gram or an ounce, but a cup is never a cup. I suppose you would like to start baking bread with your starter, and for baking bread, you will need a kitchen scale anyway.
• Jars - I recommend a set of two weck jars that can hold 1 pound to change glasses between feedings (you don't need to change them every time, though). I just place my lid with the rubber seal on top, without sealing the jar, so that the air can escape from the jar. It's important that you allow the air to escape, or the glass could break.
• Markers - It is important that you mark the jar right after you feed your starter so that you can better control how much your starter grows between feedings. You can use either water-based markers or a rubber band to mark how full the glass is.
• Spatula - To keep the sides of the jar clean and monitor growth, it's best to use a spatula to scrape down the sides of the glass. After feeding, the sides of the jar will be dirty, making it difficult to tell how much growth has happened.

Top tips

• My top tip is to watch your starter. Look at it, smell it, and learn from it. Try to understand what happens at which stage. This will give you the confidence to tell when your starter is ready, when to feed it, or if something is wrong.
• Don't overfeed it. You want your starter to be at or past peak before you feed it again. If you regularly feed it before peak, you will dilute the wild yeast cultures and weaken the starter over time.
• Don't start baking bread with your starter until it predictably doubles in 5-6 hours when fed at a ratio of 1: 5: 5 (1 part starter, 5 parts flour, 5 parts water). Why do I recommend this ratio? Because it's the same or a similar ratio that you use to bake bread, and you can be sure that your starter is strong enough to make a loaf of bread rise.

FAQ's

What does it look like when it is ready?

It will look different at different stages. A ready-to-bake starter doubles or triples in 4-6 hours, has lots of bubbles, and is thick.

Why does my starter have a dark liquid on top?

The liquid is called hooch and is alcohol that is produced as the wild yeast ferments. It's nothing to worry about. It's just an indicator that it's time to feed as your starter is hungry. Stir the liquid back into the starter before feeding and don't discard it. Otherwise, the hydration level of your starter is altered.

Photo diary

The following photo diary is a visualization of how my new starter grew from day 1 to day 14. Remember, your starter can look and behave very differently than mine. Every starter is different.

Day 1 - The freshly mixed flour and water mixture is thick and heavy like thick pancake batter. It just smells like flour.

Day 2 - Very little activity, just a few tiny bubbles, and minimal growth. The consistency is a little thinner than yesterday and looks like thick paint. The smell reminds me of cream cheese.

Day 3 - I see on the sides of the jar that the starter is already past peak and deflating (it is below the highest point it has ever reached). This means it's past peak activity and time to feed. It grew about 10-20% until it reached the highest level of activity. It's much thinner, has lots of tiny bubbles, and the smell is fruity and cheesy.

Day 7 - After feeding my starter regularly for another 4 days, I see it change noticeably. It's full of bubbles, thicker, and already doubles in between feedings. The cheesy smell has completely disappeared and ranges from sweet and yeasty to sour.

Day 14 - I've steadily increased the feedings and after 14 days I can say I have a healthy and active starter. It's very thick, airy, and bubbly. It peaks around 6 hours after feeding. The smell reminds me of overripe fruit.

At this point, you can start using your starter for baking. Store it in the refrigerator and feed it once a week.

Recipe