Sourdough happens to be our favorite bread type. When it finally became hard to find my favorite bakery’s fresh loaf, coupled with again seeing a friend’s amazing pictures I couldn’t stand it anymore. On May 9th I decided to finally embark on my own sourdough starter journey. Since the start of Covid-19 lockdown in March, I had been seeing friends and celebrities I follow share their sourdough loaves.

In the beginning, I didn’t have time. I know that is a cliche thing to say, however, it is the honest truth. Between the dates of March 11 and March 31st, our volume was up 140%, or 1,807 messages received. By contrast, the dates of Feb. 23rd to March 10, before lockdown in Washington state began that number was only 624 messages. Our team of 3 was, to put it mildly, overwhelmed. Our ticket numbers continued to stay high, with everyone who wrote in on fire for a few more weeks. Thus it wasn’t until May that I finally could consider creating my own.

My first loaf was not without a major fault: I forgot to add the salt in early in the recipe. While this doesn’t seem like a big deal, it meant my salt was not incorporated very well, or in some cases, not at all. While the favor was generally good, should you run into a pocket of salt, it was intense.

Fast forward to today, my bread is looking good and thus far my starter is still happy. I’ve played around with added some whole wheat flour to the mix. It’s been hard to find. I have also purchased a banneton, to proof the loaf in.



I had read from several places this is the better way to proof a loaf, the bowl was working well for me so I didn’t feel the need to spend the extra. I decided to buy one after needed the large mixing bowl for something else while my bread was proofing. Whoops! Due to Covid-19, it took FOREVER to ship/arrive. I will say, it does make for some pretty loaves! Yes I know I am not cutting deep enough. I couldn’t find one of my sharper knifes and ended up ripping the dough more than cutting it for the loaf pictured below.

Seeing the different structures of the inside has been a lot of fun too. I try to fold it in different ways to see how it changes. To stir/fold my dough, I use a dough whisk. I bought these to help fill an otherwise very small order, I felt guilty for doing that, however, boy am I glad I did! They are great. I am often prepping my dough during the work day, they have allowed me to mix or fold with ease and not need to spend 10 minutes washing my hands after.

What starter recipe did I use you wonder? It’s the America’s Test Kitchen Sourdough Starter. However, you can also check out their quarantiny starter for a smaller starter. Mine lives in a wide mouth mason jar in the fridge when not being used.

Other things I have been playing with is the flour mix. For my Sunday loaf, I used 2 oz of whole wheat flour and the remaining was unbleached all-purpose. Today’s loaf, I used mixed 5 oz of artisan bread flour in. I’m honestly not sure the difference between artisan bread flour and bread flour except the bag style, price, and quantity. I would normally have not bought artisan bread flour however, like many, I haven’t been able to find normal bread flour.

A few sources of inspiration I have found are linked below.

• King Arthur’s 10 Tips for New Sourdough bakers.
• When I thought I killed my started, this really helped! Troubleshooting.