The starter

One of the most important elements in baking sourdough at home is having a good starter. You may have heard stories of people jealously guarding and nurturing their starter, naming it, carefully feeding it and controlling the temperature and environment it lives in. In truth, this makes it sound a lot more complicated than it actually is.

A sourdough starter is simply a mixture of flour and water – combining the two activates the wild yeasts and bacterial spores naturally found in flour. And, given time, these microorganisms become strong enough to make the bread rise.

All sourdough starters follow the same process. Yeast eats sugar present in the carbohydrates (the flour). This creates lactic and acetic acid (the sour taste in sourdough) and carbon dioxide. The latter gets trapped in the dough’s gluten structure, creating little bubbles that make the dough rise. Every time the starter is fed, this little army of yeast gets stronger and more populated. The stronger the sourdough starter, the better the bread.

Sourdough starter ingredients and equipment

A glass flip-top jar makes a good vessel for a starter – when it’s out at room temperature, the lid can be left slightly open to release excess gas, and then shut again while it’s in the fridge.

I either use strong white bread flour or a combination of strong white bread flour with wholemeal, rye or spelt flour to make my starter.

Accurate digital scales are a must when feeding the starter, to ensure you are feeding it with exactly equal parts flour and water.