Sourdough for baking.

As part of food security, I have been using sourdough starter to bake bread with. I thought I would share with you how to get a good starter going. The recipe for bread is very basic you mix flour, starter, salt, and water.

To start a sourdough starter. Mix one half cup of all purpose flour and one half cup of room temperature chlorine free water in a bowl. Using non chlorinated water is very important. The chlorine in tap water will slow your starter and cause it not to leaven properly. I use water left over in my tea pot. After you heat tap water in a tea pot it removes the chlorine. Let the bowl of flour and water sit uncovered on the kitchen counter. Before you go to bed feed the starter with another half cup of flour and water. Continue feeding twice a day for several days till you have about 3 cups of starter. Then put your starter in the refrigerator.

Your starter should be nice and bubbly and about as thick as pancake batter. It should not have a strong sour smell.

Sourdough starter has two cycles that it goes through after feeding. First is a yeast bloom, then a lactose bacillus bloom that eats the waste product of the yeast. It is the lactose bacillus that gives the starter it's sour characteristics. The lactose bacillus will make your sourdough starter acidic which slows yeast growth. So you have to practice archiving a balance in the ph of the starter. If you let the starter get too acidic then it will not leaven bread properly.

I will post the bread recipe in a few days. You will need a dutch oven and active starter.