Hi! Day 1 of starting sourdough!!! Woot. I used whole wheat to start it off and the recipe I have says to use all purpose the rest of the time period. Question I have mainly pertains to the HUGE bag of bleached flour I have once my starter is established (I was going to use the unbleached bread flour for the remaining days…unless anyone thinks otherwise ie. continuing to use whole wheat since that’s what was used day 1)…would you incorporate the bleached to making loaves once the starter is ready? I honestly only buy big bags like this for making bread (first time dabbling w sourdough…so it was just regular white bread before lol). I guess I can just use it for non sourdough things going forward…idk I’m just hopeful for my starters success and wanna do alllll the sourdough things and don’t wanna buy a HUGE bag of unbleached until this is done lol.
by corinalb
9 Comments
I personally would save the bleached flour for other baking ventures and rely on the bread and wheat. You can make sourdough with bleached AP, but it generally does not translate well to a solid yeast production. Not fun going through a whole day of following a recipe only to find your bread hasn’t risen!
My personal preference… I feed my starter the whole wheat and make my loaves with the bread flour. AP is for other baked stuff
King Arthurs bread flour is great for starters and makes nice, open crumb loaves. I currently go with that as my base and mix in some whole wheat once in a while.
For me, 20% is WW, 80% is BF, and 20% is for the starter and the bread. Everybody has their own style, though. I never use AP.
A couple of different types of flour to play with or rolled grains or seeds? Dried fruit and nuts? Buy the smallest amount you can find because it lasts longer than you would expect. Health food stores or grocery outlets can have some cool ingredients
Personally, I feed my starter with a mix of 50% unbleached AP, 25% WW, and 25% rye. Then I use straight unbleached AP when I bake
I’m seeing a commissary purchase!
When it comes to feeding, just use whatever.
When it comes to baking, you’ll want to use mostly bread flour for the protein content
Unbleached:Wholewheat 50:50