Hi, I'm Sam. I have been keeping a sourdough starter going in my refrigerator since March of 1994, which means it is older than my cat and has outlived two toasters. I bake two loaves most weekends and I have gotten enough questions from co-workers and neighbors about "how do you do that" that I finally sat down with Netscape Composer and made a page. Everything below is what actually works in my kitchen. It is not the only way, but it is a way that works, and if you follow it you will get bread.

Quick jumps: Starting a starter | Feeding it | The basic loaf | Dutch oven method | Troubleshooting | About Gus | County fair

You do not need to buy anything or send away for anything. Wild yeast and the bacteria that make sourdough sour are already on the flour and in your kitchen. All you are doing is giving them a place to live and feeding them until they take over. It takes about a week, sometimes ten days if your kitchen is cold.

You need: a glass jar or a plastic container (quart size), flour, water, a spoon, and patience. I like to start with whole wheat or rye flour for the first few days because there is more for the yeast to eat, then switch to plain unbleached all-purpose. If your tap water is heavily chlorinated, let it sit out in a pitcher overnight first.

It is ready to bake with when it reliably doubles in size a few hours after you feed it, two or three feedings in a row. If it takes a full day to double, keep going for a few more days. Cold kitchens are slow kitchens; on top of the refrigerator is usually the warmest spot in the house.

Here is the part people get nervous about. It is less work than a houseplant.

• If you bake every week or two (that's me): keep the starter in the refrigerator with the lid loose. Feed it once a week: discard all but about 1/2 cup, stir in 1/2 cup flour and 1/4 cup water, leave it on the counter for a couple of hours until it starts bubbling, then put it back in the fridge.
• Before baking: take it out the night before, discard down to 1/2 cup, feed it, and leave it on the counter. In the morning it should be bubbly and domed on top. If it looks sluggish, feed it again and wait another 4-6 hours. Use it when it's at its peak, not after it has fallen back.
• If you keep it on the counter you have to feed it every day, and in summer twice a day. I only do this the week before the fair.

The float test. Drop a spoonful of starter into a glass of room-temperature water. If it floats, it's full of gas and ready to go. If it sinks, it either needs more time or another feeding. This is not perfect (very wet starters sink even when ready) but for a starter of the thickness I describe here, it works.

Hooch. If you forget your starter for three weeks and there is a layer of grayish liquid on top, that is alcohol, and it is a sign your starter is hungry, not dead. Pour it off (or stir it in if you like it more sour), discard most of the starter, and feed it two or three times over a couple of days. I have revived Gus from much worse.

This makes one big round loaf. I give weights first because a kitchen scale (mine was $20 at the restaurant supply place) makes bread so much more consistent, but the cup measures are close enough to get you there.

1. Mix. Stir the starter into the water until it's cloudy. Add the flour and mix with your hand or a big spoon until there's no dry flour. It will be shaggy and sticky. Cover and let it rest 30 minutes. (Bakers call this rest an autolyse; it lets the flour soak up the water so the dough is easier to handle.)
2. Salt. Sprinkle the salt over the top with a splash of water and squeeze it through the dough until you can't feel it anymore.
3. Bulk rise with folds. Leave the dough in the bowl, covered, at room temperature for 4 to 6 hours. During the first two hours, every 30 minutes or so, wet your hand, grab the edge of the dough, stretch it up and fold it over the middle. Turn the bowl a quarter turn and repeat, four times. That's one set of folds. Do three or four sets. This is instead of kneading. The dough is done rising when it has grown by about half, feels airy, and jiggles when you shake the bowl.
4. Shape. Turn it out on a lightly floured counter. Pull the edges into the middle to make a rough ball, flip it seam side down, and drag it toward you with cupped hands a few times to tighten the skin. Put it seam side UP in a bowl lined with a well-floured dish towel.
5. Proof. Either leave it out for 2-3 hours, or (this is what I do) cover it and put it in the refrigerator overnight, 8 to 14 hours. The cold proof gives you more flavor and a loaf that is easier to score.
6. Bake. See the Dutch oven method below. Without a Dutch oven: heat the oven to 475°F with a baking sheet or stone inside and a metal pan on the bottom rack. Turn the loaf onto parchment, slash the top 1/2 inch deep with a razor blade, slide it in, pour a cup of hot water into the metal pan (careful, steam!) and shut the door fast. Bake 20 minutes, then lower to 450°F and bake another 20-25 until deep brown.
7. Wait. Let it cool at least an hour before cutting. I know. The inside is still setting up and if you cut it hot it will be gummy.

Oven spring is the sudden puff a loaf gets in the first ten minutes in the oven, when the gas in the dough expands and the crust hasn't set yet. Good oven spring means a tall loaf with an open "ear" where you slashed it. You get it from three things: a properly risen (not over-risen) dough, a very hot oven, and steam in the first part of the bake so the crust stays soft long enough to stretch. That's why the Dutch oven works so well.

This is the single biggest improvement I ever made and it cost me a trip to the thrift store. A heavy lidded pot (cast iron, enameled cast iron, or even a heavy stainless stock pot with a lid) traps the steam coming off the loaf itself, so you get a bakery crust in a home oven.

1. Put the empty pot, lid on, in the oven and heat to 500°F for at least 30 minutes. (Take any plastic knob off the lid first, or wrap it in foil.)
2. Turn the cold, proofed loaf out onto a sheet of parchment paper. Score it.
3. Take the pot out (oven mitts, both hands, respect it), lift the loaf in by the parchment, put the lid back on, and return it to the oven.
4. Bake 20 minutes covered, turn the oven down to 450°F, take the lid off, and bake 20-25 minutes uncovered until it's as dark as you dare. Darker is better. The dark crust is where the flavor is.

The bottom of the loaf can scorch in a very hot cast iron pot. If that happens, slide a cookie sheet onto the rack under the pot for the second half of the bake.

Every starter needs a name so you remember to feed it. Mine is Gus. He was born on March 12, 1994, in a mayonnaise jar in the apartment I was renting off Hawthorne, from nothing but rye flour, tap water, and a used paperback bread book I got for three dollars. He went quiet on day five, I nearly dumped him, and by day eight he was climbing out of the jar. He has moved house with me twice, survived a two-week vacation in 1996 with only a note to my roommate that said FEED GUS, and once spent a month forgotten behind a jar of pickles before I found him with an inch of hooch and brought him back. I've given away jars of Gus to probably thirty people. If you're one of them, e-mail me and tell me how he's doing.

Big news for this page: my sourdough boule took a second place ribbon in the yeast breads division at the county fair last month (August 1999). The judge's card said "excellent crust and flavor, crumb slightly uneven." I had let it proof a little too long that morning because I was fussing with the car. First place went to a woman who has been entering for twenty years and her loaf was, I have to admit, perfect. Next year, Gus. Next year. The ribbon is on the refrigerator door, right above him.

Coming soon: a whole wheat version, a sourdough pancake recipe for using up discard, and the pizza dough I make on Friday nights. My scanner is on the fritz so no bread pictures yet, but I did buy a roll of film.

Other bakers and cooks on GeoCities worth a visit: Rosa's Kitchen Table (she runs our WebRing), The Weekend Winemaker, and Science at Home: Kitchen Experiments, which explains the yeast and bacteria business better than I can.