Understanding Sourdough Starter | feeding, ratios, leaven, when to use, what to feed

hi there welcome back to another video if you've been around here for a while welcome to the new Baker Bettie studio space my husband and I actually moved a few months ago and we were able to set up a little space in our new apartment for me to film in so welcome to the first video in this new space and if you have not been around here for a while and you're new here welcome I am Baker Bettie and I am a professional baking instructor and I really hope that you will decide to stick around here for a little while and subscribe so in today's video I really want to take a deep dive into how sourdough starters function and cover all of the nuances of how different people approach feeding their starter what ratios they used to feed the different types of flours they use to feed and how they use their starter to go into a dough so this video is not going to be covering how to actually create a sourdough starter from scratch because I actually have a whole series that already covers that so if you do not already have an active sourdough starter I will leave a link for that for you in the description so you can head over there and get to this point in the process now I want to just help you build a better understanding of just kind of how everything functions because as with anything in the sourdough world there are a million different ways to approach things and no one way is the right way so I like to just kind of help you understand all of the differences between the methods so that you can sort of decide what works best for you okay first let's talk about feeding your starter so as you probably already know your starter is a living culture living within this mixture of flour and water are a lot of yeast and bacteria and those organisms need food and when I'm saying food I'm talking about fresh flour and fresh water being given to it so that it can thrive so the more of this culture that you keep the more life there is within it and therefore the more food it is going to need but how much food is the right amount of food now that is probably the most common question I get because there are a lot of different approaches for the ratios to use to feed your starter now at a minimum you really need to be feeding your starter what is called a 1:1:1 ratio now what this means is that however much starter you will keep you need to feed it equal amounts flour and water by weight so just to keep this simple for understanding say you kept 10 grams of your starter now you need to feed it 10 grams of flour and 10 grams of water at a minimum for that one 1:1 ratio and while that fresh flour and water is food for your active culture it has now become a part of your culture so in this example you would now have 30 grams of sourdough starter now this is just a minimum feeding that you need to do and there are many different ratios that people use you might hear people refer to a 1 to 2 feeding or a 1:3:3 or even 1:4:4 or 1:5:5 so these ratios represent the amount of food you are giving your starter compared to how much you keep I typically do a 1:3:3 feeding which means however much culture I keep I give it 3 times the amount of flour and water so in our example where we kept 10 grams of starter for my 1:3:3 feeding I would do 30 grams of flour and 30 grams of water which means after my feeding I would have 70 grams total starter now these are just example amounts you can keep as much or as little starter as you want and feed that depending on what you need so if it is a baking day for me I will keep a larger portion of my starter and feed that my same ratios then if it's a non baking day so I am somebody who does keep my starter at room temperature because I I bake with my starter really frequently but I don't bake with it every single day so if it's a day that it's a non baking day I will only keep five grams of my starter and feed that 15 grams of flour and 15 grams of water so that gives me 35 grams total starter which means the next day if it is a baking day I can keep a larger portion of that and feed that so that I have enough to go into my bread dough but if it's a non baking day again I really don't have very much sourdough discard so I think this is something that people get really confused about in the sourdough world there's really no reason to be keeping large quantities of starter every single day if it's not a baking day you can really increase or decrease your amounts very easily and I really encourage you to do that to reduce how much discard you do have okay so in order to understand the differences between these types of feedings and why you might want to use one over the other I think it's important to understand sort of the cycle that your sourdough starter goes through after it is fed so once you give your starter fresh flour and fresh water those organisms in the starter are going to start feeding and creating co2 gases so what will happen is your starter is going to start rising up in the jar now I just fed my starter probably about thirty minutes before I started filming so I'm not seeing a lot of rise in my jar yet but what's going to start happening is this mixture is going to start writing rising up in the container and it will eventually kind of look domed on top you're gonna see a lot of bubbles on the side and on the top now that domed shape on top of your starter when you look down into the container is a sign that your starter is still going up it still has food it's still really active and it hasn't run out of food yet that you have given it now eventually that dome on top is going to flatten out and if you were to look down into your container from the top it would start to look almost weak like it could collapse really easily so once your starter gets to that flattened point where it looks like it could collapse easily this is called its peak point which means that the starter has run out of food and it is at its most active state but it's going to start going back down in your jar and as it starts going back in the jar it is becoming less and less active because it has run out of food so it will eventually fall all the way back down in your jar if you don't feed it at that point and the reason it starts deflating is that it is no longer creating those co2 gases and the gases that it did create are just slowly releasing out of the starter so depending on a number of factors this whole cycle is going to happen at different rates if you live somewhere where your house is really cold this is going to happen slower than if your house is really warm also if your starter is younger if it's a brand new starter this might not happen as quickly or depending on the ratio that you use to feed it so if you were to feed your starter a smaller ratio a 1:1:1 feeding that is going to cause your starter to peak much quicker then if you do feed it a larger ratio like a 1:3:3 feeding and that is just because with the smaller ratio your starter is going to have less food to go through and therefore it's going to peak much quicker now once your starter peaks and if you were to let it fall it's going to start smelling more and more acidic and the longer you let it sit it can kind of start smelling like acetone or paint thinner or something like that and that is a sign that your starter is in a hungry state and it really needs to be fed now there are different theories about how to approach this and when to feed your starter there are some methods that really encourage you to feed it right as it peaks or right after peak and to not let it get into this hungry state now this method assumes that it's really bad for your starter to sit in a hungry state and that it's going to produce inferior bread if you do do that and that you need to keep it fed at all times however there are other approaches that are okay with letting it sit in that hungry state for some amount of time and this is actually my approach so my approach is that I have you feed it once every 24 hours regardless of if it has already peaked and fallen in the jar now the reason this is my approach is one it's because it's the way I learned and it has always worked out really well for me but also it's always my approach to help things feel really simple and approachable for people and I think that allowing your starter to be fed only once a day the same around the same time every day is a little more approachable for the home baker now my house typically sits around 72 degrees Fahrenheit so when I feed my starter the 1:3:3 feeding it will typically completely peak around the 12 hour mark and start falling which means there are about 12 hours in between my feedings in which my starter sits in a hungry state and it still works great for me and I make great bread with it now there's actually a really well regarded sourdough baker here on YouTube and he actually keeps his starter at room temperature and only feeds it right before he bakes with it which means his starter might sit unfed for up to a week or more now this is not my approach I wouldn't push it that far but he does make great breads with that approach the reason why I wouldn't push it that far is it is possible for your starter to start molding over if you do neglect it for too long but this is just to say that there are a lot of different approaches no one way is the right way and so you can just figure out what works best for you the older your starter is the more resilient it's going to be so definitely don't neglect it in the beginning for sure and I don't encourage you to neglect it at all but you don't have to be super super rigid about your feeding if you're somebody who's a home baker that's just trying to make really good sourdough bread you're not trying to sell your loaf now if you are somebody who is trying to open a bakery and trying to have really consistent results and sell your breads you probably do want to be a little more rigid about how you feed your start or what you feed your starter and all of those things so just keep in mind that your starter is going to have its own time line my time line of having my starter peak around the 12 hour mark is dependent on my room temperature being around 72 degrees Fahrenheit my ratios of 1:3:3 and also just how old my starter is and how active my culture is so everybody's going to have their own time line so knowing all of this you can see how you can change those ratios that we talked about in the beginning to better meet your needs if you are living somewhere that is extremely warm and your starter is peaking really really quickly you might want to increase that ratio or add an extra feeding in contrast if you live somewhere that's really cold you might want to reduce that ratio so the next most common question I get is when do you know when your starter is ready to go in to your bread dough and the answer to this question is actually a little less complicated than you might think there is actually a pretty big window of time in which your sourdough starter is going to be vigorous enough to 11 your bread and where you use it within that cycle after it's been fed it's kind of dependent on what you're looking for so a few hours after you feed your starter when it starts looking really really bubbly on the sides and bubbly on top it has that nice dome on top and it probably has at least doubled in size this is kind of the first point at which your starter is vigorous enough to leaven a loaf of bread now there is a test called the float test where you can take a little scoop of your starter and gently drop it in a glass of water and if it's you know it is vigorous enough to leaven your loaf of bread now this test is not foolproof you have to be really really careful not to deflate the air out of it when you do go to do the float test now this first point at which your starter is active enough to leaven bread is sometimes called a young starter now this word can be a little bit confusing because some people use the word also to refer to a starter that's just brand new and isn't quite active yet but the earlier you use your starter in this cycle after feeding the more mild flavored your bread is going to be because it just hasn't had as much time to ferment and build up as much flavor now this younger point of your starter is also going to be in a stage in which it is really really working to become more and more active which means when you use it at that point it is going to leaven your bread a little bit quicker now if you use your starter when it hits that full peak point or just before it hits that full peak point that is where you are going to get the most rise out of your bread it's not going to happen as quick as it does if you use it at that young point but overall you are going to get a bigger rise out of your bread now this peak stage is also going to give you a more complex flavor and you're gonna have a little bit more sourness to your bread if that's something that you're looking for now you can also use it a little bit past peak so at that point where it's starting to fall down it hasn't completely fallen down you can still go ahead and use your starter to leaven or bread now at that point you're gonna have even more sourness in your bread but because it has run out of food and it's starting to kind of go into this dormant state it is not going to be as powerful to rise your loaf of bread you're probably not gonna get as big of a rise out of it but you are going to get more flavor and more sourness if that's something that you're looking for so my starter usually gets to the point where it's vigorous enough to go into a bread it's in that young the starter state probably around the four to our mark and then it can go all the way up to about the 12 hour mark so there is a pretty wide timeframe in which I can go ahead and use my starter to leaven my bread now I do want to quickly address something that can be really confusing especially for new sourdough bakers and this is the concept of creating a leaven now the word leaven is really just referring to the part of your starter that is going into the bread dough however there are some methods that approach this as creating a little offshoot starter that you feed and they call this building your leaven or creating your leaven and you're gonna take a little portion of your main starter and feed that separately and that entire portion would then go into your bread dough and your main starter would then be maintained separately now there are a lot of reasons why someone might want to do this if they wanted to change the hydration of the leaven that was going into their dough for some reason if they wanted to feed it something differently than what they usually feed their regular starter with or if they really needed to change the timeline of when the Leben was ready to go into a bread however I think for most everyday home sourdough bakers this process is not only unnecessary but it's really confusing so I did want to address that just so you understand what people are talking about when you do see that in a recipe however it's not my approach I don't see a lot of need for it in most everyday sourdough baking I prefer to just feed my regular starter enough so that I have enough to go into my bread dough and then I have enough left over for my next day's feeding okay so let's quickly talk about the timing of your feedings and how you can adjust it to better meet your schedule for your bread dough so there's really no reason to create an offshoot leaven to change the timing of your feedings if you are on the 24-hour feeding schedule and that doesn't work out for the bread dough that you have scheduled you can just add an extra feeding in or feature starter a little bit early or a little bit late starters are resilient it's not going to really mess with it now same thing is if you are on the to add a feeding schedule the 12-hour feeding schedule if that timing doesn't work for your bread dough you can just feed it a little bit early or a little bit late alternatively now that you understand how the feeding ratios work you can increase or decrease your ratios to better meet your schedule so if you need your starter to be ready to go into a dough much quicker you might want to use the one-one-one feeding schedule or if you need to extend that time for when it's ready say you wanted to feed your starter before you go to bed and you're not going to start a dough until the next morning you can increase that feeding ratio so that it has a little bit more of an extended time or when it's ready to go into your dough all of this is just to say that this is my very relaxed approach to sourdough starter there are a lot of different theories some people believe you really need to be more rigid and again if you are selling your bread you probably do want to be much more strict with yourself but for home Baker's you can be a little more relaxed about it so another common question I get is what do you do after your starter goes into your bread dough do you need to feed it immediately so that kind of depends on what method you follow if you are somebody that is feeding your starter right when it Peaks then yes it probably is about time to feed it again because you're probably going to be using your starter close to that peak time now if you're somebody who is just doing the one a day feedings like I do then no you don't need to feed it right away so I will use my starter in my bread dough and then whatever is left over in my jar I just leave it until the next day feeding when I do my typical feeding the only reason why I might feed it right away is just if I needed to start a bread dough quickly after I already started one which is pretty rare I might do that if I am making dough for a workshop or something but you can just keep it on its norm feeding schedule after it goes into Adel okay let's quickly talk about what to feed your sourdough starter so pretty much any type of flour that is made from wheat as long as it is unbleached flour can be used to feed your starter so you can use unbleached all-purpose flour you can use spread flour whole wheat flour white whole wheat flour or a lot of people like to use rye flour so depending on what you're looking for out of the flavor of your bread can kind of dictate what you might want to feed your starter when you're first building up your starter I always encourage people to use whole wheat flour because whole grains are going to encourage fermentation more quickly but once your starter is really nice and active you might decide to switch to other types of flour depending on what you are looking for so a starter that is fed with all whole wheat flour or all right flour or a really high ratio of whole grains is going to create a more sour bread now these whole grains also ferment more quickly so they are going to probably peak more quickly than if you were feeding your starter all white flour now in contrast if your starter is fed with all white flour like all-purpose flour or bread flour it is going to create a more mild flavored bread I personally like to use a combination of some whole wheat flour and some white flour at a one to two ratio so I do one part whole wheat flour and about two parts bread flour and I pre mix those together I actually keep a container here which is my starter blend and then that is already pre-mixed for me to just use whenever I need to feed my starter now I like this combination because it gives me a nice balance of a little bit of sourness but not too much sourness and I like to use the bread flour when feeding my starter just because that extra protein content in it gives it a little more strength but you can very easily use all-purpose flour and in fact if I'm running low on bread flour I will use all-purpose flour now if you do want to change up the type of flour you're using to feed your starter you can definitely do that it's probably going to take a few feedings for your starter to adjust and regulate to the new type of flower but it should definitely be able to do that I would suggest if you do want to change what type of flour you're using that you take part of your starter and feed that separately from your main jar maybe put your main jar in the refrigerator or just keep it fed separately with your normal feeding until you're sure that your new starter is going to adjust to that new type of flower like I said it should definitely adjust but just as a little insurance policy and you might want to change the type of flour you're using if your starter is just not as active as you'd like it to be sometimes adding in a little more whole grain or even a little bit of rye flour can really really boost the activity of your starter okay now quickly before we end this video I do want to address storing your starter and feeding it from the refrigerator and sourdough starter discard now I actually have two videos that address these topics more in depth I'm going to leave links for them but because these are some of the most common questions I get I'm just going to quickly address them here so if you are somebody who does not bake really frequently with your sourdough starter if you bake with it less than once a week I would suggest keeping it in your refrigerator so that way you don't have to feed it every single day if you do store it in your refrigerator you are going to want to feed it about once every 10 days just to keep it really nice and healthy and not neglect it too much so when you are going to feed your starter from the refrigerator I like to take it out and let it sit on the counter for an hour or two just to kind of let it wake up and then I go ahead and do my normal feeding now after I feed it if I'm just doing a maintenance feeding and I'm not going to be baking with it I will let it come up in the jar a little bit for a few hours let it get really bubbly so that it's starting to feed on those flowers but I don't let it to that peak point where it has gone through all of its food so I let it get active for a few hours and then I put it back in the refrigerator because I want it to go back in the refrigerator still having some food left for it when it's in the refrigerator the activity is going to slow down very very slowly but it's not going to stop completely so it's good for it to still have a little bit of food once it goes in the refrigerator now if I am taking out of the refrigerator to bake with it I will feed it and usually I will give it maybe two feedings maybe three feedings before it does go into a bread dough now you can technically feed it once use it put it in a bread dough however it's gonna be a little more sluggish with that just one feeding so plan a little bit of head give it two feedings and then you can go ahead and use it in your bread dough now after you use it in your bread dough if it has already peaked before you put it in your bread dough I would give it one more feeding let it get a little bit active and then you can put it back in the refrigerator okay now I have a full video about sourdough starter discard what it is how to reduce it how to use it I'm going to link that below but just very quickly I know people are very concerned about sourdough discard they don't want to have waste and I completely understand that however hopefully now you see with these ratios that we talked about and how to increase and decrease how much you're keeping you see that you really shouldn't have a huge amount of discard if you are decreasing your ratios based on if your baking or not you should only have a tiny bit of discard so I actually have another jar like this that I keep in the refrigerator I just add my discard it to it and that is kept in the refrigerator for several reasons I can use that discard in recipes like my sourdough discard muffins or I have backup starter in the refrigerator if something were to happen to this active starter I could easily take out that and feed it and get it nice and active however I do also want to say try to keep a little bit in perspective definition of waste hopefully if you are baking bread at home you are replacing that with bread that you bought at the store and bread bought at the store is probably packaged in plastic it's probably been shipped across the country and so if you do need to toss just a few tablespoons of flour and water in the grand scheme of things it's much less wasteful than if you're buying bread at the grocery store now I will also add that there is a method called the no discard method and there's a youtuber named baked with Jack who has a whole video on this method it's not my personal approach but if it's something that you think might fit better for your needs I definitely recommend seeking out that video and he will give you an in-depth explanation of how to do the node discard method I know this was a lot of information thank you so much for sticking with me to the end I have a ton of sourdough videos I'm gonna leave the whole playlist linked below so if you're somebody who's new to the sourdough world I know it can feel super overwhelming but I have also a whole video on the understanding the whole process of a sourdough bread so it's very similar to this video kind of walking through all of the nuances all of the steps and different approaches and I think that should also help you understand a little bit better just stick with it keep practicing and you will get there now if you enjoyed this video I hope you will consider giving it a like and sharing it with other people who might enjoy it and I will see you all next time with another video

Channel: Baker Bettie

Views: 338,287

Rating: 4.9434876 out of 5

Keywords: sourdough, sourdough starter, leaven, levain, what is a leaven, starter vs leaven, how to create a leaven, how to feed my starter, what to feed my starter, sourdough bread, how to make sourdough, joshua weisman sourdough, bake with jack sourdough, timing of sourdough starter, how much do I feed my sourdough starter, how to increase my starter, how to store my starter in the fridge, what to do with sourdough discard, sourdough for beginners, how to make sourdough bread

Id: lsZDOWss3eE

Length: 28min 20sec (1700 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 15 2020