Sourdough Starter How-to

When we think of bread/bread-making, we think of bakers who went to apprenticeship programs and have probably spent years honing their skill. But anyone with the right recipe, a little practice, and a little finesse, can learn to bake bread that might make you surprised.

I don't know about you, but I've always thought it was cool to be able to do something on my own; especially something that most people didn't and/or weren't able to do. It's just cool to be able to be independent in that way. Cooking from scratch is one of those things. To be able to can your own fruit, make your own jerky, or even get your own milk is in my opinion, very satisfying. Baking bread is also in this category. For this blog post, I'm going to be talking about starting a sourdough starter for making (you guessed it!) sourdough bread.

Now, just what is a sourdough starter? A sourdough starter is mixture of yeast and bacteria that is added to the bread dough mix to A) help the dough rise, and B) add a unique flavor to the bread. One of the by-products of yeast is carbon dioxide, which is a gas, which makes the dough rise as it gets filled with the gas.

How does this all go into plants and mycology? Well, yeast is a type of fungus, if you didn't already know! There are actually 1,500 different currently know species of Yeasts; and Yeasts are also used in the making of beer, wine, and sodas as well.

Now you're probably either going "Wow, that's actually pretty cool!", or "Blah blah blah just get to the how-to already!". I understand. Without further ado, here it is.

Materials

For this Sourdough starter, you will need 

1)Container of some sort (could be a jar,or even a plastic cup that's a good size)

2)Some way of measuring out things ( a Dixie cup, a measuring cup, pretty much anything)

3)All-purpose flour

4)DeChlorinated water, at a tepid temperature

A quick note on the water; you don't want the water to be too hot, as it will kill the yeast and bacteria that land there. You also want to dechlorinate it. You can do this simply by boiling the water for 20 minutes, or letting the water sit out overnight.

For simplicity, I'm just going to pretend to use Dixie cups.

Steps

1) Fill the Dixie cup with the flour, pour into the container

2) Fill the Dixie cup with The water, pour into the container

3) Mix the flour and water thoroughly

4) Place on a Somewhat sunny windowsill

5) Feed the mix every 12 hours. (it's okay if you forget, just feed it the next time)

5) Repeat this process for at least 2-3 days, it should start smelling a little sour/funky after that amount of time

6) Once you think it's got that good sourdough smell, You can use it to bake some sourdough bread!! 

You can find many sourdough bread recipes in cookbooks, and on the internet, but let me know if you guys would like to see a recipe post in the comments!

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As always, thank you for reading, sharing, and just taking the time to click on this link. byyyeee!