Ways To Use Your Extra Sourdough Starter (2024)

FAQs

What can I do with my extra sourdough starter? ›

Instead of throwing away (or composting) your excess sourdough starter during the feeding process, bake with it! Unlock the power of sourdough discard to both enhance your bakes with a subtle tang and make the most of those leftovers.

When the starter has close to doubled, refrigerate it and relax until the next time you want to bake. Try not to let the starter double and sit unfed for more than a few hours at room temp. Either feed it or hibernate it in the refrigerator.

Sourdough discard can be defined as the portion of unfed sourdough starter that you remove from the jar before adding fresh flour and water. This "leftover sourdough starter" is called discard because it can be discarded or thrown away.

With each sourdough starter feeding, you'll be discarding some to avoid it from becoming overly acidic. Most will compost or trash this discard, but you can save it and use it in other recipes!

Storing: Crumble Into Dry Flour

Crumbling live sourdough starter (unfed) into dry flour. This is by far my preferred method for long-term sourdough starter storage.

If you don't discard your sourdough starter, it will grow too big and be unmanageable. Not to mention you will go through an unmentionable amount of flour.

As a general rule, the less sourdough starter you use, the slower your dough will ferment - resulting in a more sour flavored loaf. The more starter you use, the faster your dough will ferment - resulting in a less sour loaf.

Example of How To Increase Your Sourdough Starter

If you have 50g of starter in your jar, but you would like to have 200g of starter because you want to bake a few different things then you would need to add 100g of each flour and water to that starter to make 200g (because 200g divided by 2 is 100g).

Technically, yes you can use sourdough discard to start another starter, however I advise against this unless you have a mature sourdough starter that you are wanting to share with family and friends. Then you can portion off a little discard that they can feed.

Can I use a starter that has started to fall? ›

Past-Peak and Falling: If your starter/leaven is past-peak and is beginning to fall in height, it is beyond the optimal point to use it for baking, but it will still work. The only thing to consider is that once a starter peaks, it starts to become more acidic as it falls.

Take your starter from the fridge and let it come up to room temperature. Feed it with 30g of strong white flour + 30g of water, stir it well, and allow it to become fully active and ready to use, this can take 2-6 hours depending on the room temperature.

Generally, a smaller amount of sourdough starter is all you need. But there are some instances where you might want to increase the amount of starter you use. Some instances could be: If it's particularly cold, you could increase your sourdough starter to make your bread ferment more quickly.

Fortunately, you can chill or even freeze your sourdough starter to slow down the yeast's activity and preserve it until you're ready to bake. Sourdough starter stored in the fridge will stay in good shape for the occasional baker who might be making a loaf or two every couple of weeks.

CAN SOURDOUGH DISCARD BE USED TO MAKE A NEW STARTER? Yes! The amount you pour off can be fed in a separate bowl to create a new starter or “levain.”