Sourdough Starter by PaddyL

[BakerAunt]

Sourdough starter
Submitted by PaddyL on March 05, 2009 at 11:18 am

You can follow Linda Collister's to the letter, but I found that trying to keep the cheesecloth covering damp was too fussy, so I just placed a piece of plastic wrap lightly over the plastic container which I kept on top of the fridge. And I stirred it at least 3 times a day until it started to expand.

3/4 cup all-purpose flour, preferable unbleached
1/2 cup tepid water (I used tap water.)

Put the flour and water into a small bowl and mix to a sticky paste. Cover the bowl lightly with plastic wrap (L.C. says NOT to do this, to use damp cheesecloth fixed tightly in place with an elastic, but this just did not work for me.). Leave in a draft-free spot on a kitchen counter, or on top of your fridge.

After 2 to 4 days, your starter should look bubbly, and you'll be feeding it. At this point, I just added a handful of flour and stirred in enough water so make it pasty, but a little liquidy at the same time. Stir it well, cover it again, and leave it for another 24 hours.

By that time, it should look pretty active. Stirring helps a lot. You feed it again, discarding about half of it, maybe less, before adding more flour and water, cover and leave it another 12 hours or so.

Now it should be ready to make bread, but you'll have to make sure you have a little more than the 1 cup that you need for the primary batter; the rest can go into the fridge.

If this isn't clear, or you have any problems, just ask and I'll try to help.

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