Gluten Free Sourdough Starter

Last Christmas, I started a sourdough starter and enjoyed baking with it throughout the year. We used it to make pancakes, waffles, banana bread, sourdough bread, cookies, brownies... 

Sourdough bread has lots of benefits! It's fermented and contains pre and probiotic properties, so it's great for your gut! It can lead to better digestion and keeps your blood sugar healthy. So, when we started switching our diets over to gluten free, I knew that I would want to try my hand at making a gluten free sourdough starter so we could continue our baking. 

We're about a week and a half in to the journey, and I thought I'd share about how I'm making the starter because I'm getting lots of questions when I share over on Instagram.

I'm using King Arthur's gluten free flour. I also saw that Costco had a gluten free flour the last time I went in, and I'm planning on picking that up the next time I went in.... Costco's regular flour worked great for our last starter. 

To get started, you'll need a small jar. This one is from Ikea, and has a closeable top. But, you don't actually have to close it. I usually latch it, so it has a bit of an opening, but you can also put a towel over the top and seal it with a rubber band. 

With this particular starter, I'm using a 1:1:1 ratio. 

You'll also want a kitchen scale and you'll need filtered water. The chlorine in your tap water will kill your starter. 

To begin your starter, add 50 grams of flour to 50 grams of water. 

When I made my original starter, I was mixing 100 grams of each, and I realized I don't need to keep that much starter on hand, so I cut it in half. You could potentially start with 25 grams. 

Once you mix the flour and water, set it aside until the next day. 

On day 2, you'll begin discarding. It's just a fancy term for throwing half away. To do this, I measure 50 grams of the mixed starter out into a bowl, and I throw the rest of it in the trash. You do not want to throw it away in your sink because it can clog your drains, and at this point, you can't save your discard (the amount you throw away) because it's not fermented enough to bake/use in other recipes. 

After you have 50 grams of your mixed starter in a bowl, and you've thrown out the rest, you'll add your 50 grams of starter back into your bowl. Then, add another 50 grams of gluten free flour, and 50 grams of filtered water. Stir and cover.

At this point, I've read that you'll want to discard and re-add flour/water two times per day through the first week. Now, I don't remember doing that when I started my original starter last year, and I didn't do it this time around, until I remembered. Once I remembered, I discarded and fed 2x per day for about 3 days. I may go back in and try it if I'm not seeing it doubling by the end of this week.

This is what your starter will look like when it's mixed. 

I'll continue this process until I notice it doubling in size after I feed it. It usually takes a few hours to double, and that's when you know your starter is healthy and active, and you're able to bake with it. Again, we're a week and a half in, and my starter isn't doubling, but it is bubbling and showing signs of activity, so I'm hopeful that it will double too! 

You also want to make sure your starter isn't in a cold/drafty environment. We keep our house around 74 degrees, but if I feel like it needs to be warmer, I'll place the jar in the oven with the light on to give it some heat. Do NOT turn on your oven-You will kill your starter! 

When I started my original starter last year, it took almost a month to get it bubbling, active, and doubling in size. We had company over and there was lots of movement and activity in our home, and it was just hot. I looked at my starter and it was huge and almost overflowing! I was so excited because that's how you know you're ready to bake!

As I go further in to the process of making the gluten free starter, I'll continue to share and hopefully inspire some of you to start your own! 

 

Sourdough

Last Spring when we were in quarantine, I had a lot of friends that were jumping on the sourdough bandwagon. I started a starter then, but when I tried making bread, I failed miserably. I was able to use my sourdough starter I had made then for cookies, waffles, pancakes, and we tried brownies too, but my bread was not successful. 

Eventually, we got busy with summer and I threw it all away. The day after Christmas, I thought maybe, I'd try it again and see what happened. 

I started making my starter, which takes several weeks. In fact, it took me a solid month before I was able to have a starter that was bubbling and dubbling after each feed. 

To make my starter, I used King Arthur Flour's starter recipe. Basically, you mix 1 cup flour with 1/2 cup water, and each day, you'll discard all but 113 grams, add in 100 g flour and 100 g water, and stir. You do this over and over again until your starter bubbles and dubbles. 

I found a big glass jar from Ikea to keep my starter in and I use a rubber band to mark where the starter  starts after I feed it. 

The part of the starter you remove (all but the 113 grams) is called "discard." There are some people who never have discard, but I keep my discard in a bowl in the fridge, and when I want to bake cookies, pancakes, or other sweets, I use my discard rather than my starter. I've actually found that after adding in my discard each time, it's nice and bubbly too. I keep it in the fridge, and take it out when I want to bake, and I don't feed this one extra flour or water. It's literally just everything I take out of my starter. 

Yu know your discard is ready when it's nice and bubbly! 

When I first made bread with this new starter I used a recipe a friend shared on Instagram and it did not turn out well. I think that my starter wasn't quiet ready. One afternoon, we had lots of cooking going on in the kitchen- my parents were in town, we were cooking, the oven was on, lots of bodies were in the house and it got really hot in here. That's when I noticed my starter really bubbling and rising, and I knew it was finally ready. 

I found a recipe online and screen shot it and that's the recipe I've been using each time I bake bread. (I'm sharing it below.)

I also purchased a proofing basket for when the dough needs to rise. 

Once your starter is ready, you add the ingredients, let the dough rest for 30 minutes, complete a fold and stretch, and let the dough rise overnight. In the morning, you complete a few more fold and stretches, and then form it in to a ball, and place in your proofing basket and let it rise for another hour and a half. 

You'll then flip the dough out of your basket on to parchment paper, score the top, and bake for about an hour. 

The result is gorgeously warm and delicious bread! 

The inside is nice and bubbly. 

I made bread again at the end of last week, and the girls and I devoured it that same day. There's something amazing about fresh, warm, homemade bread right out of the oven.

The nice thing about your starter is that you can leave it in the fridge, and pull it out when you want to bake. So, when we went camping, I put it in the fridge, and pulled it out about 2 days before I was ready to bake, and started feeding it again. Right now, I'm planning on baking bread weekly- Friday mornings or the weekend. 

Here are my screenshots of the recipe I'm using, and maybe one day, I'll type it out ;) 

I told DJ as I was making our 3rd loaf that I feel very domesticated. There's just something about the process that feels very domestic and brings me back to my roots of watching my grandma make her bread. Having the dough in your hands, shaping, forming. It's a process I'm falling in love with.