Does sourdough have to be complicated?
Aspiring sourdough bakers often tell me that it seems overwhelming or they don’t know where to start.
Especially after they search online and get overloaded on information… conflicting opinions, different methods, unfamiliar terminology…
Roadmap to Easy Sourdough for Complete Beginners
The easy way to begin sourdough is with ONE approach, which begins with the sourdough starter.
Once you get familiar with the sourdough starter, the other pieces of sourdough baking will feel easy in comparison.
Before, I explain my approach, make sure to check out this post with video and helpful info. about what a sourdough starter actually is:
My method for caring for a sourdough starter is easy, low waste, and fast:
- Start with an established starter, you can make your own from scratch, but I recommend beginning with one you get from a friend, a neighbor, or buy online. See recommendations here.
- You’ll have one jar of your most recent batch of sourdough starter and one clean jar that you will use to begin the next batch in the process called refreshing. See a video here.
- There are three stages of sourdough: just refreshed, active, and discard. Other bakers use other terms but these are fairly common. Learn about these stages in my what is a sourdough starter post or get my free Sourdough Quick Start Guide.
- I keep my starter in the fridge when not in use. This makes it hibernate in a sense because the cold temperature slows down the activity.
- The ratio I use to refresh my starter (which is what you do to get it active), is 10% of the most recent older batch of starter and 90% fresh flour and water. This encourages more vigorous activity than other methods.
- For best results after a starter has been in the fridge, do a refresh then 12 hours later do it again. After the second refresh you’ll have a beautiful active starter with great activity!
The Bread Making Process
If you’ve baked bread with commercial yeast, you have the advantage of knowing the basic stages of bread making:
- Activating the yeast
- Mixing and Kneading
- Fermentation aka First Rise
- Shaping Process
- Proof aka Second Rise
- Baking
- Cooling
The process of sourdough bread baking has the same stages, except these two key differences:
- we activate a sourdough starter and not granules of commercial yeast and
- the stages take much longer with sourdough than with commercial yeast.
The steps of this process are the same for every loaf of sourdough bread, the only differences are that timing can fluctuate based on ingredients and other factors.
See the step by step sourdough bread baking process with photos and videos in this post:
How to make a basic country loaf with step by step photos
What about tools?
This is where many people can get hung up or stalled.
You do not need all the “right” tools to get started!
10 years ago, I began my sourdough baking journey with just a jar of starter, a mixing bowl, kitchen spoon, and a cast iron Dutch oven I used for soups and stews as a wedding gift.
There are hacks and shortcuts to skip specialized bread baking tools so you can get started right away.
This post has the most minimal and basic tools needed to get started without spending hundreds of dollars and putting off your starting day:
Beginners’ Guide to Sourdough Bread Baking Tools on a Budget
Get started faster
The pivotal point that took me from kind of understanding sourdough baking to confidence was a course.
Understanding why I was doing certain steps and what was happening in each step helped me become a better sourdough baker.
My Intro. to Sourdough course will get you started right away with an easy step by step approach.
You will get your “aha” about sourdough starters and the sourdough baking process without the time and stress of searching around online.
In my Intro. to Sourdough course, I walk through
- sourdough starter 101
- each sourdough baking step with video demonstrations
- bonus videos for pizza and sandwich bread
- handouts including my trademark ONE-PAGE sourdough baking illustrated page that my students rave about!
You can begin your sourdough journey with confidence and easy methods with instant access:
Get access to Intro. to Sourdough
Sourdough Discard… What is that?
Sourdough discard or leftover starter is a whole other world in this fun realm of sourdough baking!
You can learn all that you need to know in my sourdough discard video and post series here:
How to Store Sourdough Discard for Starter Discard Recipes
How do you use sourdough discard? (7 uses and video)
But do not get caught up on discard when you are getting started. Focus on getting familiar with the sourdough cycle, getting your starter active, recognizing when its active, and then using it in a recipe.
