Sourdough Starter & Bread

Most people are familiar with sourdough bread, but did you know that you can make sourdough starter and bread easily at home? All that's necessary to get started is some whole grain flour, water, and a non-reactive bowl or jar.

Starter recipe & attribution: King Arthur Flour

No-knead Bread Recipe: Bittman, the NY Times (Tip: Use about 1/3rd cup of starter instead of the packaged yeast mentioned in the recipe).

Here's the kick-off!

Two Days Later

Here, we can see the texture is changing and bubbles are starting to appear, which is a good sign that fermentation is on track. At this point, another week of care and feeding - and then it should be possible to use this starter for baking!

About Two Weeks Later

Two weeks later, ready to rumble! I learned a lot about what to do better and why it took so long, too ;-) Basically, don't feed quite as often, use 1:1 ratio flour to warm water when feeding, and a warm environment is better (at least 72 degrees F or so).

The First Loaf

The first finished loaf (a little too crusty, because it was baked at 450 degrees F, but the flavor was just fine). Alongside some Moroccan chickpea stew (recipe & attribution: The Clean Dish).

The Third Loaf

Learning more refinements, the best loaf yet! A third of it was eaten right after it had cooled, it was that good. Nice and spongy, lots of air bubbles within, and just enough crust. This was baked at 400 degrees, instead of 450 degrees as described in the recipe, making the crust just right.

Some other observations:

• The starter has gotten better over time! After several care and feeding cycles, it's become more responsive and active, yielding effectively the same results as dry, store-bought yeast :-)
• Use flour specifically for "bread making" if it's available. It will yield better results. I've also mixed one cup whole wheat flour with two cups unbleached general purpose flour, and that works, but it results in a loaf that's more dense and with less rise. Some breadmakers say adding a tablespoon of oil to the dough mixture before baking helps in this case, but I haven't tried that yet.