How to Maintain A No Fuss Sourdough Starter

Sourdough can seem intimidating, because there are so many rules out there. I take a no-fuss sourdough approach, and I am sharing it below.

You’ve come to the right place for tips on how to maintain a no fuss sourdough starter. Let’s jump in!

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How to Maintain a No Fuss Sourdough Starter

Store it in the Fridge

I keep my sourdough starter in the fridge when it’s not in use. This puts it into hibernation, if you will. It allows you to store it without feeding it.

I typically keep my starter in there for a week to 2 weeks, tops. When I’m done using my starter, I put the lid on and stick it in the fridge for storing. If you store it on the counter, you’ll have to feed it daily. By storing it in the fridge, you only have to feed it every so often.

Ditch the Scale

I don’t use a scale for my sourdough. I never have. Some might think this is a “sourdough sin”, but I’ve had no trouble without it.

I usually use a teaspoon, a wet measuring cup and a dry measuring cup when making bread. I guess to some, that might seem like a lot of things to clean, but it feels easy to me and it works.

Feed it 1:1:1

When feeding your starter, feed it equals parts of everything. First, take it out of the fridge. If you have a cup of starter (I estimate how much starter I have just by looking at it – doesn’t have to be exact), then you should feed it one cup water and one cup flour.

I mix it up with, gasp, a metal spoon… and then put a towel over top of it on the counter for 4-6 hours before using it. To make my bread making schedule simple and easy to follow, I take my starter out and feed it around lunch time, mix up my bread dough around bedtime (8pm or so), put a little olive oil in a big bowl, put the dough in it and cover it with plastic wrap to sit on the counter overnight. I typically bake it sometime that next morning.

Don’t worry about discard

If you don’t use your starter very often, you might need to worry about discard. But for me, I find that if I’m using my starter every time I pull it out to feed it, I don’t have to discard anything (except for what I remove to use in my recipe). Discard is simply removing some starter (prior to feeding it) so you don’t end up with a huge starter.

If you do have to discard some starter, there are many discard recipes out there, so you don’t actually have to throw it away.

If you were looking for tips on how to maintain a no fuss sourdough starter, I hope you found these tips helpful.