How To Make Your Own Sourdough Starter

Want to learn how to make your own sourdough starter? This basic sourdough recipe will let you make your own sourdough starter from scratch without yeast and with only 3 ingredients. It’s easy, a great natural leavening substance, and doesn’t require a sourdough starter kit.

Making Your Own Sourdough Starter

So, I had to learn to make my own sourdough starter. I know I had written a number of sourdough posts, and had a healthy starter. However, it got moldy. Which means it had to be thrown out. It’s wasn’t safe anymore. I was offered starter from the same friend who gave it to me, but I wanted to learn to make my own so I could teach you all how to make your own sourdough starter.

Ingredients Needed To Make A Simple No Yeast Sourdough Starter Recipe From Scratch

• 5lb Bag Of Bread Flour
• 1lb Bag Of Whole Wheat Flour
• Distilled Water
• Large Glass Jar or Mason Jar
• Piece of Cloth or Paper Towel
• Rubber Band

How To Make This Easy Sourdough Starter Recipe

Step 1

Add 1/2 cup of whole wheat flour and 1/4 cup warm distilled water into your large glass jar/mason jar.

Step 2

Mix until it is smooth. It will be like paste. If it’s too thick and you can’t mix in all the flour then you can add a splash more water. Cover with a breathable lid. If you close the lid to your jar it WILL NEED TO BE BURPED.

Step 3

Leave for 24 hours, preferable in a warm area.

Step 4

Check to see if your sourdough mixture is bubbly. If it’s cold it make take longer. The bubbles can also pop and disappear. Which is fine, just leave it for another 24 hours.

Step 5

On the 3rd day you will discard and remove half of your starter from the jar.

Step 6

Add 1/2 cup of bread flour and 1/4 cup of distilled warm water and add it to the jar and mix until smooth. It’ll start being like thick cake batter by now.

Step 7

Cover again and let rest in a warm spot for another 24 hours.

Step 8

Repeat steps 5-7 for 3 more days. You should see your mixture start to rise and bubble by now.

Step 9

By the end of the week your starter should have doubled in size and should be very bubbly and almost spongy looking. It should also smell bready and yeasty.

Step 10

Now that you have a healthy starter, transfer it to a new clean jar.

Recipe Notes:

If it’s cold in your home it can take about 2 weeks for your starter to get all bubbly and rising.

Once your starter is ready and gets hungry, it can create hooch. It will smell like alcohol. Usually you’ll pour the hooch off, but if you see it in the beginning, just leave it.

If you see any mold growing, you know the nice fuzzy stuff. Dump it and start over.

As you add bread flour, your sourdough starter won’t look like ground mustard anymore, but get more white in color. That’s okay. The wheat is only to feed is well in the beginning.

How Do I Store My Homemade Sourdough Starter?

There are two ways to store your homemade sourdough starter. It really depends on how often you use it and bake.

If you bake a lot you’ll want to leave it on the counter and feed it 1-2 times a day to keep it healthy and fed.

If you don’t bake a lot you should probably put it in the fridge. It’ll only need to be fed 1-2 times a week. When you need some you can add 1/4 cup in a jar and add 1/2 cup of flour/distilled water to get about 1 cup of starter. It may take over 24 hours for it to really bubble up though.

Always keep it covered though. If you close a tight lid on it, make sure you burp it a few times a day or else your jar will explode.

Is Sourdough Starter Just Flour and Water?

As you’ve seen from this sourdough starter recipe, yes, it is just flour and water. Though there are some recipes that use yeast directly in the recipe. I ain’t about that life. The less ingredients the better in my opinion. I love a good no fuss recipe.

Plus, yeast and I don’t have the best relationship, so I have a tendency to try to avoid it for the most part.

Plus, as I mentioned, the fewer ingredients the better. Fewer ingredients means it is more budget-friendly…usually. And in this case the sourdough starter is indeed budget friendly.

How Does Sourdough Starter Rise Without Yeast?

So, sourdough is super cool and healthy as well because it’s fermented. Do you know what sourdough starter is? It’s a live fermented culture created with flour and water. The culture or sourdough starter actually ferments which helps cultivate the natural yeast that is in your area. Cool, huh?

So sourdough works as a yeast, rises as a yeast, and makes everything all fluffy and delicious like yeast, but it isn’t from a packet that you have to have the perfect temperature to make it work. Sourdough is a little finicky, but so much more user friendly once you understand it and get used to using it.

Want To More About Sourdough? Then Check Out These Other Sourdough Recipes From Homemaking For God

• Learning About Sourdough Starter and All It’s Do’s and Don’ts
• Try your hand at making this super yummy and easy sourdough biscuit recipe
• You should also try making this sourdough pancake recipe

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