Golden Sourdough Waffles - Easy Sourdough Starter Recipe! (2024)

FAQs

How to make flavorful sourdough starter? ›

To a clean jar, add 100g whole rye flour and 125g warm water. Mix ingredients and keep somewhere warm for 24 hours. To clean jar, add 75g of the mixture from Day One (discard the rest), 50g whole rye flour, 50g all-purpose flour, and 115g water. Mix ingredients and keep somewhere warm for 24 hours.

To limit acidity: Refresh the mother culture when it has just risen to its final height. Similarly, use the pre-ferment when it has just peaked or even before the peak, and limit the initial rise (bulk fermentation) to a doubling of volume.

Once it's ripe, remove the amount you need for the recipe (I almost always use between 100-200 grams) and then save 20 grams, feeding it with 20 grams water and flour. You're back to having 60 grams of starter to keep for next time with enough to bake your bread now.

My starter is very acidic. How can I de-acidify it? Try feeding your starter a high feeding ratio (e.g., 1:5:5) and discard and refeed right after the starter rises and peaks. This is known as the “peak-to-peak” method.

It would be best if you discarded some portion of your starter each time you feed it unless you want to continue to let it grow. Eventually, you need to discard the used “food” (flour and water) that's been used to sustain your starter during the last fermentation period.

There is no single best ratio, but I've found a ratio of 1:5:5 fed twice daily at 12-hour intervals to produce a sourdough starter that's strong and healthy. This ratio corresponds to 20% ripe starter carryover, 100% water, and 100% flour (a mix of whole grain rye and white flour) at each feeding.

The best flour blend for creating a new sourdough starter is 50% whole-meal flour (whole wheat or whole rye) and 50% bread flour or all-purpose flour. I recommend a 50/50 mix of whole wheat flour and bread flour. Why do you need to use these two types of flour?

Starvation - if you don't feed your starter for a long period of time it will develop harmful bacteria and mold. This will smell terrible and look orange, pink or fuzzy and green. Mold - mold can also occur in a well fed starter if there are mold spores on any of the equipment you've used or in the flour you're using.

Using flours with more ash, or mineral, content, will yield more sour taste. If you can't get enough ash, adding a bit of whole wheat flour to your recipe, which is what is done with the 20% Bran Flour, will boost the sour of a bread. Conversely, using a lower ash flour will tend to produce a milder bread.

I keep my starter jar very clean by scraping down the sides and wiping the rim every time I feed it, so I transfer it to a clean jar once every few weeks. If you keep a very messy starter jar you may want to transfer it to a clean jar more frequently. The only thing that can really kill your starter is mold.

Can I use sourdough starter straight from the fridge? ›

Yes, you can bake with sourdough starter straight from the fridge | King Arthur Baking.

Starter that's kept at room temperature is more active than refrigerated starter, and thus needs to be fed more often. Room-temperature starter should be fed every 12 hours (twice a day) using the standard maintenance feeding procedure: discard all but 113g, and feed that 113g starter with 113g each water and flour.

How do you know if sourdough starter has spoiled or gone bad? The main indicator if a sourdough starter is still good or not is if it will still rise and fall after feeding it fresh flour and water. If it does, it's still alive!

Typical signs of food spoilage and mold include pink, orange, or green colors, white fuzzy spots, or sometimes areas that are darker with white areas on top. If you see any of these signs, I would recommend throwing your starter away and creating a new one.

Flour with more protein and nutrients make sourdough starter more active, so consider feeding your starter with bread flour, whole wheat flour, rye flour (or a combination of these) to increase fermentation activity and rise. Thicken the starter (lower hydration ratio).

Using flours with more ash, or mineral, content, will yield more sour taste. If you can't get enough ash, adding a bit of whole wheat flour to your recipe, which is what is done with the 20% Bran Flour, will boost the sour of a bread. Conversely, using a lower ash flour will tend to produce a milder bread.

Still, there are three specific factors that can really affect your bread's flavor: The health of your starter. The level of the bread dough's organic acids. The complex relationships over time between levain, dough, fermentation, and proofing.

If your starter is always strongly acidic smelling, you can de-acidify your starter by using a high feeding ratio (e.g., 1:5:5 or 1:10:10) or by doing a few rounds of “peak-to-peak” feeding – discarding and feeding as soon as the starter peaks.

Those wild yeasts can be mild or tangy. This is why San Francisco sourdough is so famous. It has VERY tangy local wild yeasts. If you want a different flavor in your bread, one easy thing to do is purchase a sourdough starter with a flavor profile you want.