So you've decided to start your sourdough journey.

Congratulations.

Soon you'll have a jar of fermented flour living on your counter, a growing emotional attachment to bubbles, and a tiny blob quietly dictating your schedule.

Welcome.

If you've ever wondered how to make a sourdough starter from scratch, you're in the right place.

What even is sourdough starter?

At its most basic, sourdough starter is simply flour and water.

That's it.

But once wild yeasts and beneficial bacteria begin growing, that simple mixture transforms into a living culture capable of naturally leavening bread.

Which sounds very scientific and impressive until you realize you've started referring to it like a household pet.

At some point, there's a decent chance you'll:

• name it

• talk to it

• stare at it waiting for bubbles

• or proudly show pictures of it to people who absolutely did not ask

This is normal.

And full transparency?

I've done absolutely all of these.

Yep. I've been the friend sitting at a restaurant table pulling up pictures of my starter on my phone.

So… how do you actually make one?

The good news is that creating a sourdough starter is surprisingly simple.

The bad news is that it requires patience, consistency, and a willingness to spend several days wondering if you accidentally created wallpaper paste instead of a living culture.

To get started, you really only need:

• flour

• water

• a jar

• and a little patience

Most starters begin with equal parts flour and water by weight.

A simple starting point is:

• 50g flour

• 50g water

Mix it together, loosely place a solid lid on the jar, and let it sit at room temperature.

And yes, I specifically mean a real lid.

Not cheesecloth.

Not fabric covers.

Not paper towels held on with rubber bands like the internet loves to suggest.

Your starter does need a small amount of oxygen exchange, but a loose-fitting lid handles that just fine while still allowing gas to escape.

Paper towels and cloth covers, on the other hand, can allow contaminants, mold spores, fruit flies, and other unwanted kitchen chaos into your jar—and nothing ruins your sourdough journey faster than realizing you accidentally grew something horrifying instead of a healthy starter.

Your first starter: a simple step-by-step guide

If you just want the practical version, here’s a simple way to get started.

Day 1

Mix together:

• 50g flour

• 50g water

Stir until fully combined.

Loosely place a solid lid on the jar.

Leave it at room temperature for 24 hours.

Then try very hard not to check it every 12 minutes.

Days 2–7-ish

Once every 24 hours:

1. Discard all but 50g of starter.

2. Add 50g water and stir well.

3. Add 50g flour and mix again.

4. Loosely place the lid back on.

5. Leave it at room temperature.

Repeat this daily.

Some starters are ready in about a week.

Many take closer to 10–14 days.

Some need a little longer because apparently even fermented flour likes to have its own timeline.

Keep going until your starter is consistently active, predictably rising and falling, and reaching peak activity after feedings.

That is usually when it is strong enough to start baking with.

And yes, there’s a very good chance the first loaf will still humble you a little.

That’s also normal.

Now that you have the basic steps, let’s talk about what’s actually happening in that jar—because this is where beginners usually start asking, “Wait… am I doing this right?”

Wait… what's "discard"?

"Discard" simply means removing part of the starter before feeding it.

Otherwise your starter would continue growing endlessly until you somehow ended up with enough starter to fill a bathtub.

And to make sourdough terminology slightly more confusing, discard is also the term bakers use for the unfed starter that gets removed during feeding.

So discard is both:

• a verb: the act of removing starter

• a noun: the unfed starter itself

Welcome to sourdough.

For example:

• you may have around 150g total in your jar

• discard roughly 100g

• leaving about 50g behind

• add 50g water and stir well

• then add 50g flour and mix again

And no, you do not need a brand-new clean jar every single feeding like some videos online suggest.

Your starter will survive just fine without creating extra dishes for yourself.

One important thing to know while creating a brand-new starter: the early discard should be thrown away.

At that stage, the culture is still unstable and developing, so it's generally not recommended to cook or bake with it yet.

Once your starter is fully established, though, some bakers choose to save their discard for pancakes, crackers, cookies, muffins, waffles, and other recipes.

This is completely optional.

You do not have to maintain a discard jar to be a "real" sourdough baker.

Personally, my starter lives at room temperature, and I maintain about 40 grams of a stiff starter (we'll get into stiff starters another time).

With each feeding, I'm only discarding about 35 grams of starter—roughly enough to fill one large spoon.

Not exactly the mountains of discard social media sometimes makes it seem like.

A note about water

I strongly recommend using filtered or spring water, especially if your local tap water contains chlorine or other treatments.

Those chemicals can interfere with fermentation and make it harder for your starter to establish and stay active.

The awkward middle school phase

Somewhere around days 2–4, your starter may suddenly explode with activity and make you think you've mastered sourdough immediately.

You haven't.

This is usually a temporary bacterial bloom that settles back down after a day or two.

And honestly? This is the stage where a lot of people panic and assume they killed it because suddenly the bubbles disappear.

Keep feeding it anyway.

Around days 5–10, you'll usually start seeing:

• bubbles throughout the jar

• more consistent growth after feedings

• a tangy aroma

• and eventually a predictable rise-and-fall cycle

This stage can feel confusing, but it’s really just your starter figuring itself out.

Which is relatable, honestly.

Feed peak to peak

One of the biggest game changers in understanding sourdough is learning to feed "peak to peak."

That simply means feeding your starter after it reaches its highest point and before it begins receding back down the jar.

At peak, your starter is:

• full of activity

• filled with bubbles throughout

• showing a textured top with bubbly peaks and valleys instead of a smooth domed surface

• and importantly, it has not yet started receding down the jar

Don’t be fooled by the TikTok bakers telling you that once your starter doubles, it’s automatically ready.

Some starters may double.

Some triple.

Some (mine, for example) even quadruple.

The exact rise matters less than learning your starter’s individual rhythm and recognizing when it has reached maximum activity before beginning to fall.

Once you start learning that rhythm, you’ll notice it has a pretty predictable cycle:

• the rise: starter is growing and we’re watching anxiously for it to peak

• the peak: starter has reached its most active point, and we’re trying desperately not to miss it

• the fall: "Oops, we missed it." The starter is deflating in the jar as the yeasts begin running out of food and activity starts tapering off

And feeding peak to peak helps strengthen the culture over time because you’re consistently refreshing it while the yeast population is strong and active.

Feeding ratios: this is where things get fun

A lot of beginners start with a simple 1:1:1 feeding ratio.

And honestly, I do think mastering those basic feedings first is important.

But once your starter is established, you don’t have to stay there forever.

You can feed:

• 1:2:2

• 1:5:5

• or even 1:10:10

Higher-ratio feedings often take longer to peak.

And even more importantly, they often stay near peak longer before beginning to fall.

That means you can start timing your feedings more intentionally around:

• work

• sleep

• baking schedules

• or attempting to maintain some kind of life outside of sourdough

And honestly, that’s when sourdough starts feeling a lot less intimidating and a lot more flexible.

Because eventually you realize:

you’re not just feeding the starter anymore.

You’re learning how to manage fermentation itself.

The refrigerator: where neglected starters go to survive

One of the biggest misconceptions about sourdough starter is that you have to feed it constantly forever or it will instantly die.

Thankfully, starter is usually much more resilient than that.

If you’re not baking every day, storing your starter in the refrigerator slows fermentation dramatically.

Translation:

you can go live your life again.

Most refrigerated starters do perfectly well with weekly feedings, and even starters that have been ignored a little longer than intended can often be revived with a few good feedings.

Because yes, at some point you will absolutely forget about it.

And then experience a completely unreasonable amount of guilt over neglecting fermented flour.

That said, on a personal note, my mother starter—the small portion I maintain day to day—will never see the inside of the fridge.

My personal opinion is that the best way to keep a starter at its strongest and most active is through regular feedings at room temperature.

Of course, some bakers strongly agree with that, and others strongly disagree—which is pretty standard in sourdough. What’s a new hobby without one army insisting there’s only one “right” way to do things while another army passionately arguing the exact opposite?

But that doesn’t mean refrigeration is wrong.

Honestly, the refrigerator is an incredibly useful tool for taking control of your schedule.

Putting your starter in the fridge doesn’t stop fermentation entirely—it simply slows the process dramatically.

That can either:

• make your starter take much longer to peak

• or help hold it near peak activity longer

Which can be incredibly helpful depending on your baking schedule and lifestyle.

"Is this normal?"

One of the funniest parts of starting sourdough is how quickly you begin questioning absolutely everything.

Is it supposed to smell like that?

Why is there liquid on top?

Why does it smell like nail polish remover?

Is it dead?

Is it hungry?

Is it judging me?

The answer is usually:

your starter is probably fine.

The first successful loaf

And then one day, after all the feeding, waiting, Googling, overthinking, and staring at bubbles…

You pull your first successful loaf out of the oven.

And suddenly the weird little flour blob starts to make sense.

Because there’s something incredibly satisfying about baking bread from a culture you maintained yourself.

So if you’re thinking about starting your own sourdough journey, my biggest advice is this:

Don’t overcomplicate it.

Your starter doesn’t need perfection.

It just needs consistency, patience, and a baker willing to learn alongside it.

And maybe a good kitchen scale.

Even if the tiny blob occasionally becomes the boss of you.