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I once sent a friend home with some of my sourdough starter without a lesson. Sourdough can be intimidating—and even though Claudia read and spoke English fluently, it’s not her first language. So, that night I emailed her detailed instructions. My aim was to craft a clear, inviting, awe-inspiring message that would nip the daunt of learning alone. She sent a photo of her first loaf the following week—it was spectacular, better than anything I made in my first year of baking.
So, I forwarded the email to other people I’d taught—friends, family, chefs, strangers. I sent it to more than 120 people in two years. I wrote a second edition. My entire family bakes sourdough now—both sides—as well as half of my college soccer team. It has made its way into the inboxes of operational Coast Guard commands, with notes in the margins for baking on the high seas. As I write this, I am on the road in Austin, Texas, three months into a cross-country journey, and my sourdough starter is here with me, feeding anyone I stay with.
It’s the holidays and we’re nearly a year into a pandemic. These instructions are my community offering this strange holiday season; may your stay-home sourdough bakes be even better than the first time around. At least now you won’t have to search your inboxes for that dusty old email anymore, just come here. I’ll continue adding to this page to make it increasingly useful.
“Okay, so you just inherited a sourdough starter like a baby in a basket. Now what?!” —that’s how the email began. The Instructions were sent to anyone who received my sourdough starter, Miss Leavenworth. They are based on Chad Robertson’s basic country loaf, which he described in his book Tartine Bread. Based on Robertson’s method and informed by my six years of baking sourdough, my email continued like this: (I’ve added images and details to make this reference more useful than the email—and because the evolution of email-to-permanent-URL ought to have some new features, right?!)
WHAT IS SOURDOUGH?
Simply put, it’s the way bread was made for millennia, until quite recently. Sourdough is a natural fermentation process: when you mix flour and water, the microbial bacteria in the flour and on your hands and pollens and organic matter in the air catalyze a fermentation process—no yeast is added. Once you have a starter, it becomes uniquely yours, kind of like a pet dragon. A bacterially-symbiotic relationship between you and your starter begins upon first contact. Your starter is the sourdough ‘mother’. As long as she lives, she will produce food for you. She needs flour and water to thrive and she needs you to understand how she is affected by temperature. That is all.
FEEDING YOUR STARTER
Daily bakers leave their starter at room temperature and feed once per day. Since I bake a couple of times a week and don’t keep a regular schedule, I keep Miss Leavenworth in the refrigerator and take her out only when I want to make some dough. The cool temperature in the fridge allows her to survive without feeding. I’ve left Miss Leavenworth for several months and she survived––albeit with a layer of awful-looking black hooch on top. But that was an emergency (Thomas Fire) and I don’t recommend it. One summer while I was traveling I checked Miss Leavenworth into a Sourdough Inn in Brooklyn. She was the first-ever guest at the Inn and her Danish host, Mathias, is now a friend.
When you’re ready to bake, take your starter out of the fridge and activate her by feeding her flour and water and leaving her at room temperature—this will get her back to full strength before you bake. For general planning purposes, feed your starter about 1.5 days before you want to have fresh bread. You’ll get the timing down later, and learn which shortcuts you can take, or how to draw it out longer to fit your schedule. At first, she will seem like a high-maintenance child, but she’s not.
How much she needs to be fed depends on how much starter you have. I like to keep very little (about a half cup) on hand so that I don’t need to expend too much flour on feedings. (No flour actually gets wasted—I use the discard to make sourdough pancakes and other leavened delights). The ideal flour to water ratio is roughly 1:1. For a half cup of starter, she’ll need at least half a cup of flour and half a cup of water, exact measurement is not that important. Mix and cover. After a few hours (depending on the weather, warmer = shorter time required) she’ll be a frothy puppy and ready to raise a leaven. The ideal time to use your starter is when she has risen to its peak height. I am almost never attentive enough to catch her at the top of her rise. I keep a rubber band around the starter jar and after feeding I’ll slide the band to the starter height, using it as a reference for her growth.
MAKING A LEAVEN
If the starter is the ignition of the sourdough process, the leaven is the engine. Once your starter is at peak activity (around six hours or so depending on temperature), take a tablespoon or two of her and mix into about ~180 grams of room temp water in a bowl. Add about ~180 grams of bread flour (you can do all white flour or throw some whole wheat in there). Mix well and cover with a towel. This is your leaven. (You can put your starter back in the fridge now)
Let your leaven sit at room temp overnight, or for about 6-8 hours. You’ll know when it’s ready to use for making bread dough when it passes the “float test.” Take a spoon of it and drop in a bowl of water. If it floats, she’s ready. The extra leaven is your new starter. Next time you bake, feed this one and use it, she is the healthiest version of your starter. I typically take my old starter and collect it over a couple of weeks in a container until I have enough to make sourdough bagels, waffles (see pancake recipe), or croissants. That way I don’t waste any by discarding. I often use all my leaven and don’t save any and continue using the old starter because, well…I’m usually eyeballing all of these measurements, and fridge space.
MIXING THE DOUGH
This recipe makes two boules, or loaves. It calls for 1,000g of flour (one kg). I typically use around 750g of white, and 250g of whole wheat—you’ll find your own preferred white/wheat ratio over time.
Measure 700g of room temp water (you can increase hydration later on as you gain experience, but start here. You’ll be adding 50g more water later and end up with 75 percent hydration). Measure 200g of mature leaven and mix into the water until it’s dissolved. Pour that mixture into 1,000g of flour. Mix well. Use a spatula or dough whisk first, then your hands. Break up all the clumps. It will be sticky. Let sit for 30-45 minutes. This step, called the autolyse, is important. It’s the grand first meeting of ripe leaven and a bounty of flour food for the hungry microorganisms. Connections are being made, magic is happening.
After autolyse, add another 50g of water and salt. The salt should comprise two percent of your total flour, so for a 1,000g recipe, you’ll need 20g of salt. I like to dissolve salt into the water first. Mix into the dough—mix it well. Press your fingertips together and really massage it in. Cover with a towel, or put the top on your container.
BULK FERMENTATION
This is the most critical stage and, conveniently, requires the least work on your part. For the first two hours, “turn” the bread every half hour. Turning is basically a stretch and fold process to develop elasticity in the dough. Be vigorous at first, then progressively more gentle on turns three and four so you don’t knock out precious air bubbles. Reach under the dough, pull up, stretch, and fold over. Work your way around the dough doing this a couple of times. After two hours of turns, let it sit for another couple of hours until its risen approximately 50 percent and feels billowy. This time depends on the temperature in the room —colder and it needs more time, warmer it needs less time. You will learn to judge it.
Sourdough is mostly a passive process, it requires little effort on your part other than understanding, patience, and occasional hands-on. I’ve made excellent loaves without tending to the dough at all. I’ve made amazing bread while disregarding every step of the instructions I am giving you. And I’ve made absolute shit bread whilst paying close attention. I don’t plan my life around sourdough baking, which is why it works for me. If I am around the kitchen during the bulk fermentation, I follow the routine I am describing here. But sometimes I lose track of time in the woods and come back to find my bin has overflowed. This is not a problem—if you know how to adjust. In the case of an over-ferment, I’ll cut the final proofing time short and bake sooner than I would have otherwise. Say I am short on bulk fermentation time because I need to leave the house, I’ll give the dough and extra long cold final proof in the refrigerator. The one maxim that has held true for me and anyone I’ve taught over the years is that you can’t really fuck it up, sourdough is extremely forgiving.
FINAL PROOFING
After three to four hours (including the two hours of turns) of total fermentation time —or more, depending on the temperature of the room—dump the dough onto the counter and divide in half using your bench knife. Shape the dough into a round. This initial shaping is casual, just give the dough a sense of the shape you want and cover with a towel. Use some flour so it doesn’t stick. Let it rest for 30 minutes. This time is called bench rest. After the bench rest, the dough should have relaxed a bit, maybe even pancaked out. Flour your baskets with white rice flour. Stretch and fold the dough into a package, like an envelope. Be gentle, but decisive. Transfer to your basket. The side containing the folds of dough stuck together should face up, so that when you dump it out of your basket it is on the bottom. Flour the dough. Cover with towel. Let sit at room temp for a couple hours longer (if you are going to bake same day). Or put in the refrigerator overnight, or several days, or until you are going to bake it. I like to refrigerate for at least a few hours or overnight and bake the following day.
THE BAKE
You’ll need a dutch oven or pot with a lid. Preheat your oven to 500 degrees with the pot inside. Let the oven remain at 500 for 20 minutes or so and then take out your dutch oven. Transfer one loaf into it. Slash the loaf, also called “scoring,” using a razor. Cover the pot and place it inside the oven. Immediately turn the oven down to 450 degrees and bake for 20 minutes. After the first 20 minutes, remove the lid, and bake for another 20 minutes. The bread should have “sprung” or risen considerably, appear blistered on the exterior, and burnished in color.
Cool it on a rack and let it sit. Enjoy your creation! Listen to the bread song. Cut it open once its cool and realize you just changed your life forever.
Love,
Pete
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS:
Is my starter dead? Probably not. Dump that black liquid off the top, discard most of it, and give a healthy feeding of 50/50 white and whole wheat flour. Let it sit at room temperature for six hours or so. See if she’s responded, look for bubbles. If there’s no activity, discard half and repeat this process. Two healthy feedings and a warm room should revive her. If not, then do it again.
What if I don’t have a dutch oven? I highly recommend one. Lodge makes a cast iron combo cooker that retails for $39. The idea behind the dutch oven is that the enclosed container traps steam released from the dough. It allows the bread to bake without drying out. You can mimic this effect using a baking stone and by saturating your oven with water during the first half of the bake using a spray bottle to spritz the interior and walls of the oven and by using a baking sheet filled with water and a towel to keep the water from evaporating too fast. Remove the tray and stop spritzing for the second half of the bake.
What kind of flour do you use? Unbleached bread flour, whole wheat flour, white rice flour (for dusting). I typically use King Arthur because it’s the most widely available quality flour. Where available, opt for a heritage grain, locally-milled flour. Also on my flour shelf: all-purpose flour (for feedings and other baked goods), rye flour, semolina flour (for pizza nights), and white whole wheat.
I’m gluten intolerant, can I eat sourdough? Many people whose digestive systems can’t tolerate gluten have given my bread a try and felt okay! Sourdough fermentation is a digestive process in and of itself. For your gut, it’s sort of like eating pre-chewed food, the way penguins feed their young. That said, if you developed an intolerance to gluten, sourdough is not necessarily a safe alternative, but it’s worth seeing if your system accepts it.
THE BARE BONES INSTRUCTIONS
phase-by-phase
Feed with flour and water, cover, leave at room temp 6+ hours
rule of thumb: feed your starter at least as much flour + water as there is starter
II. BUILD LEAVEN
~180g flour // ~180g water, leave at room temp until mature
*float test* (she’s ready when buoyant)
mix leaven into 750g water, add 1,000g flour, autolyse for 30 min
add 20g salt and 50g more water, work vigorously into dough
turn every 30 for first two hours, leave covered at room temp for a couple more hours or once double in size
IV. FINAL PROOF
dump dough, halve, initial shaping, bench rest for 30 min
final shaping, place in proofing baskets
refrigerate overnight or leave at room temp, cooler if possible, and bake same day
V. THE BAKE
Heat oven to 500F with Dutch oven inside
Turn oven down to 450F, bake 20 minutes with lid on, 20 minutes with lid off — 40 minutes total
Remove when burnished and blistered, rack cool
