Disclaimer: We’re farmers, not professional bakers. There are countless sourdough starter recipes on the internet, ranging from deceptively simple to those requiring a chemistry degree to make sense of. We’ve gone with the simple end of the scale and this is a way that works for us with our flour.
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Having a healthy and active sourdough starter is the first step to making sourdough bread...

​Ingredients:
  • Water: if you’re on town water, it’s worth filtering it to remove the chlorine
  • Flour: we always use freshly stoneground wholegrain rye flour for our starter, no matter what type of bread we’re making
​Day 1:
  1. Mix 100g of flour with 150ml water in a glass jar. Pop a tea towel over it and sit it somewhere warm.
  2. Finding the right spot really helps it to head in the right direction quickly but can be a bit tricky. Ideally you want somewhere that’s around 21 to 24 degrees, but this is easier said than done! If it’s cold, maybe somewhere above the hot water cylinder or on top of the fridge could work, or if it’s too hot then try the pantry or cupboard. Don’t worry too much if you haven’t got the perfect spot – it’ll get there eventually!
 
Day 2:
No need to do anything, though you may want to give it a little stir to check on it and mix in the crust that might be forming.
 
Day 3:
  1. Throw away a tablespoon of the mix and replace it with a tablespoon of flour and a couple of tablespoons of water (enough to maintain the same consistency).
  2. At this point it might be smelling a little ferment-y or even just odd. Stick with it.
 
Day 4 and beyond:
  1. Again, throw away a tablespoon of the mix and replace it with a tablespoon of flour and a couple of table spoons of water (enough to maintain the same consistency).
  2. Continue to do this until the starter is properly active, more or less doubling in size after feeding and then slowly collapsing again. This might take around a week to achieve or longer, but just stick with it.
  3. At some point you’ll probably be tempted to throw the whole lot out and start again, because it seems to have gone off, but just keep feeding it daily and it’ll come good. When we first started building our starter it nearly got thrown in the compost at least twice!
  4. Once it’s all bubbly and active you can start baking with it. Here is our bread method.
 
Storage and feeding:
  • We find it works well to keep the starter in the fridge in a large jar with the lid sitting loosely on top of it.
  • We make a couple of loaves of bread around once or twice a week and just feed it at the same time, though it helps to pull it out of the fridge a few hours before using it to get it warm and active.
  • If you’re not baking with it regularly, it’s worth feeding it every week or so to keep it healthy. There have been times where we haven’t had a chance to feed it for a few weeks in a row and it’s been totally fine!