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recipes

Sourdough Starter

This Sourdough Starter is created to bake your very own homemade bread without the need for yeast. Using a quick and simple process spread over a number of days, your Sourdough Bread will be filled with flavour and those unmistakable bubbles.
Sourdough Starter

Prep Time: 7 days

Serves: 6

Cooking Time: 45 minutes

Follow this Sourdough Starter recipe and leave to one side in preparation for baking the most amazing, flavoursome Sourdough Bread. You can create this starter with Dualit's Hand Mixer.

Ingredients
  • 50g strong white bread flour
  • 50ml tepid water
Method

To make a Sourdough Starter you must have equal amounts of flour to water. The amounts listed above are what you will need to add to your starter everyday for up to seven days!

Day 1

Using your Hand Mixer, mix together the equal amounts of flour and water in a glass jar or plastic container with a lid and place in a warm room or cupboard. Mark the volume with a bit of tape or measure the depth and make a note. You will need to monitor how much the starter rises over the next few days.

Day 2

Discard half the starter and replace with the same amount of flour and water again. Stir into the mixture well, replace lid and leave in the warm environment.

Day 3

You may start to see some bubbles and it may smell sweet. Repeat the above process, removing half the starter and adding the same amounts of flour and water, stir and place in a warm environment.

Day 4

Repeat the above, the starter should have risen and will smell a little sour. Do not worry if the starter does not rise for a few days (check your marker), but continue to feed the starter.

Days 5, 6 and 7

The starter should have formed bubbles and will smell fermented and sour.

To test if the starter is ready, take a spoonful of the mixture and place in a cup of cold water. It should float on the top and not sink.

How and why it works

Yeast is present on all grains and wheat that makes our flour.

When the grains are milled and turned into flour and that flour is mixed with warm water, yeast begins to thrive and multiply in a warm environment.

As more flour and water are added to the mixture (refreshed), the yeast becomes more concentrated and produces carbon dioxide gas. Eventually enough gas is produced that when added to your dough, it will help it to rise to form bread.

Good bacteria in the form of lactic acids will also form alongside the carbon dioxide, which contribute to the flavour and texture that sourdough is known for. This also helps preserve the shelf life of your sourdough.

Preserving a starter

In order to keep your starter dormant (stop it from rising), you can place it in a covered container in the fridge indefinitely.

It is important that before the next use you take the starter out of the fridge 24 hours before using it and store it at room temperature. It should then become active again.

Do the starter check with water and if it passes then it is ready to use in your dough. If it is not ready, then start the feeding process until it is, remembering to keep the temperature warm and cruically, steady.

Any discarded starter can be used to make pancakes, crumpets, bagels and flatbreads.

Dualit product used

We used the Dualit Hand Mixer whisk attachments to swiftly mix up this starter.

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