I love my sourdough starter and how it is a constant available source of yeast for breads and baking, if cared for properly. I love how generous she is and how it engenders a culture of sharing! I also love the rich, developed flavor of natural sourdough. (It should not be sour unless the bread dough is allowed to over ripen.) I love my sourdough starter so much I named her Flora and wanted to share the fun of sourdough. I dehydrated large batches of Flora to share and here are instructions on how to reactivate her. If you are here, chances are I got to meet you at the self-reliance fair and i hope you had fun!
I have read that dehydrated sourdough can remain alive for a long time, in one case even after 10 years in food storage. So I plan on popping some of my dehydrated Flora in the basement storage for a future rainy day.
It’s important to know that Flora is still alive, just not active. She is, hopefully, in a dormant state. But, with water and food, in the form of flour, she should wake up and become active again. In just 3 days time, she should be ready to start baking with.
How to reactivate And keep sourdough starter
Place 15g starter in a small bowl. Add 1 oz (or 2 TBS + 1/2 tsp) lukewarm water. The water should cover the starter. Stir occasionally, allowing 3 hrs for the starter to dissolve.
Feed it with .5 oz (or 2 TBS) unbleached flour. Cover loosely and place it somewhere warm for 24 hrs. You should see some bubbles form at the end of the time (if the temp is around 85F, otherwise it will be longer if the temp is cooler). It is ok if it does not look very active yet; as long as there are a few bubbles, the starter is woken up.
Without discarding any starter, feed with 1 oz (2 TBS + 1/2 tsp) lukewarm water and 1 oz (4 TBS) unbleached flour. Put back in a warm spot until bubbly, around 8-12 hrs.
Repeat step 3. It should look active and bubbly at the end of the 8-12 hrs.
Resume a regular feeding schedule. Discard all but 4 oz (1/2 cup) starter. Add 4 oz (1/2 cup) water and 4 oz (1 cup) unbleached flour. Place in a warm place and allow to become bubbly and tripled in size.
*freshly fed starter at the peak of its growth may be stored in the fridge in a container that has a loose lid. I have kept starter for months without any feeding this way. A lid that is too tight and does not allow for some air exchange will kill the starter. A lid that is too loose will allow the starter to dry out and that is not ideal.
*Starter should be fed one or twice (twice if it is still slow to bubble after one feeding. You want very active starter) before being used in a recipe. Discards may be used in recipes as fed or unfed depending on the recipe. Recipe for pancakes ir waffles or crackers may call for unfed starter. Recipes for a risen bread will likely always call for fed starter. For example, when i pull my starter out of my fridge, i will pull out 1/2 cup of the starter to feed in a small bowl or jar. The rest is an unfed discard i may use for waffles or another recipe or simply just throw away or feed my pigs. Once my fed starter is active, i once again pull out 1/2 cup and put in a clean jar that it will go in the fridge in and i feed it again (it should only go in the fridge in its most active form). The leftover of this fed starter i can use to make bread or pizza dough. Or I can feed this separately to give a friend or to increase its volume.
This is an active and bubbly sourdough starter.
I always add my water first at feeding time and stir it in. I think this thins out the starter and makes the yeast more mobile and spread out. I feel like it puts them in a better condition to receive the food and helps that food be dispersed more evenly for a successful feeding and growth.
When you feed, it is important to use unbleached flour. Bleached flour becomes stale quickly and had many nutrients stripped from it. It is not adequate to feed sourdough starter with this. I only use unbleached flours in our kitchen. I use strong bread flour for feeding my sourdough starter even if i will use a different flour for baking.
Remember that only starter in its most active stage should be used to store, whether that is in the fridge or dehydrated.
I hope this works for you and you enjoy your sourdough starter! Let me know if you have any questions and happy baking!
my favorite waffles using unfed starter: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/classic-sourdough-waffles-or-pancakes-recipe
The recipe i use for my basic sourdough bread (i did buy the time stamped tutorial from her): https://youtu.be/HlJEjW-QSnQ
The recipe i use for my sourdough pizza dough: https://www.theperfectloaf.com/sourdough-pizza-dough-and-recipes/
Some fantastic sourdough pretzels (liz at food nanny includes the sourdough version for this recipe in her recipe book but 1 cup of fed sourdough substitutes the yeast and i double the rise time): https://www.thefoodnanny.com/blogs/recipes/davids-bavarian-pretzels
