Cookaholics Bulletin Board

I am on day 6 of my new sour dough starter, but have several questions. Can anyone direct me to a good resource for a newbie? I have never done this before and I’m just not confident I will know when the starter is ready to use and how to treat it at that point. Also I would love a good resource for recipes.
I’ve always wanted to have the time for this project....and I guess this is it! Now I just need to be able to score some flour.

Cookie,

It takes around 2 weeks of daily or 2-day feedings before a new starter is ready for use.

Since you're in Seattle, you should be able to get good wild yeast just by leaving it out.

Some guides:

https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-y ... tchn-47337

https://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes ... ter-recipe

https://www.theperfectloaf.com/7-easy-s ... r-scratch/

Other tips:

- start with an organic, cold-milled whole-grain flour if you can. I started mine with organic rye. This maximizes the natural yeast present on the flour
- consider getting a bit of starter from a neighbor, which could save you 2 weeks!

Thanks, Fuzzy. Actually I am now stuck in the desert in California...no going home for a few weeks, I think. I am on day 6 of my starter, which I started with King Arthur’s unbleached white flour. Nothing else was available. When I take it home, can I start feeding it with some other flours?
So, if I am on day 6, do I just keep feeding it for another week? The guide I started with didn’t say anything about discarding as you fed the starter, but today I’ve been reading that perhaps I should have. Seems a waste of good flour in these days when I can rarely find any!
So, I started with 4 oz flour and 4 oz water and added the same amount of each for 5 days, never tossing any. Today is day 6. What now?
Thanks for any advice!

Well yes, you're supposed to discard.

I can't imagine how it would hurt anything not to do so though.

However, starting with white flour and making it in the desert, you may have a bit of a wait before the flour starts fermenting. There just aren't a lot of places for natural yeast to come from in that environment; the flour is gonna have very little yeast, and the air will have pretty much none.

Note that even when I started mine using rye flour, in SF, it took two weeks to get a good culture. So you could be in for more than that.

Thank you, Fuzzy. When I am finally able, I think I will take it back to the Northwest with me and see what happens. In the mean time, I’ll fool around with this and see what I can produce.

You can add some dried fruit or a few slices of apple to the mix to add some wild yeasts, and epicurious has a bunch of recipes for extra starter up right now, as does tastecooking.com. The waffles from epicurious were great. One reason to discard some of the mix is so the remaining yeasts have better access to the new food. Also, you rapidly end up with way more starter than you can use.

I've used discarded starter in place of some of the flour when making non-sourdough bread so it is not wasted. KAF has lots of recipes for discarded starter.

Thanks for all the advice, everyone. I need "Sourdough Starter for Dummies!"

this just in from a few centuries ago - -

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-bread-did-ancient-egyptians-eat?utm_source=Atlas+Obscura+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=8e562b3dc9-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_04_07&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f36db9c480-8e562b3dc9-67654157&mc_cid=8e562b3dc9&mc_eid=fce8a24641

And one more article:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/sourdough-library?utm_source=Atlas+Obscura+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=8e562b3dc9-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_04_07&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f36db9c480-8e562b3dc9-67654157&mc_cid=8e562b3dc9&mc_eid=fce8a24641