How To Revive Sourdough Starter
Don’t throw away that neglected starter sitting in your fridge, revive your sourdough starter and bring it back to bubbly, active life with this simple feeding schedule and troubleshooting guide. Even starters forgotten for months can be brought back from the brink.
Craving The Details?
What it is: Reviving sourdough starter means feeding a mature starter that has been dormant in the refrigerator until the yeast and bacteria become active again.
Why you’ll love it: You don’t need to start over just because your starter has been sitting in the fridge for weeks or months.
How to do it: Remove the starter from the fridge, inspect it carefully, then feed a small amount equal weights of flour and water, let it ferment, repeating the process until it reliably rises.
Raise your hand if this sounds familiar…
You’re cleaning the fridge mid-September and you come across the sourdough starter you haven’t seen since May when the sunshine was calling and the shorts came out.
“Oh my god. FRED!”
Don’t worry, you can revive a sourdough starter that’s been long neglected in the fridge! Even if you neglected it as long as I did…
May 12, 2021 and September 15, 2021:
- 126 days
- … or 18 weeks
- … or 4 months & 3 days
So don’t throw out that old sourdough starter just yet!
This guide to reviving sourdough starter is dedicated to shorts season.
Note: You may hear this called reviving, reactivating, refreshing, restarting, or waking up sourdough starter. In this guide, I’m talking about the same basic process: taking a mature starter that has been dormant in the refrigerator and feeding it until it becomes reliably active again. Amount of feedings and recovery time depend on how long it was unfed.
Jump to:
- Craving The Details?
- Revive My Starter With Me!
- How Long Has Your Starter Been In The Fridge?
- Moldy Or Contaminated Sourdough Starter
- Reviving Sourdough Starter
- It’s Not Just You!
- Expert Tips
- Why This Process Works
- Reactivating Sourdough Starter FAQs
- Sourdough Starter Feeding + Maintenance
- Put That Sourdough Starter To Work!
- 📖 Printable Recipe
Revive My Starter With Me!
How Long Has Your Starter Been In The Fridge?
The length of time your starter has been in your fridge unfed will absolutely impact how long the reactivation process takes. Here’s a rough guideline on what to expect.
| Time in fridge | What to do |
|---|---|
| A few days to a few weeks | Bring it to room temp and feed it once, it should show normal activity within 6-12 hours but may need more than one feeding |
| Several weeks to a couple months | Give it 1-2 room temperature feedings 12 hours apart, and 1 feed at 24 hours before baking |
| Several months or longer | Follow the full revival process below. Expect it to take 3-5 days |
| Not sure how long it’s been | Follow the full revival process. Expect it to take 3-5 days |
| Mold or pink/orange/red streaks | Don’t try to revive it, toss your starter and start fresh |
Moldy Or Contaminated Sourdough Starter
While almost any starter can be revived, I don’t play with mold or bad bacteria. Fermenting foods takes a little bit of intuition and a little bit of ruthlessness. If something looks, smells, feels, or just could be bad – it finds the garbage quickly!
Look:
If your old starter has any kind of mold, toss that bad boy. Start fresh with my 24-hour starter recipe, and you’ll be just fine.
Once you determine your starter has no mold, look at the hooch – if it has grey or black-ish looking hooch, we’re in business. If the starter or hooch is pink-tinged, it’s straight to the trash bin, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Smell:
If the starter smells tangy, like vinegar, alcohol or even nail polish remover, that can happen when a starter has gone a long time without feeding. If it has a musty or moldy smell, smells like rotting meat or anything repulsive, toss your starter and start over.
Feel:
Texture alone isn’t a reason to throw out your starter, but it can help to identify contamination. A neglected starter should be thin and liquid, will likely have separation of the starter and hooch, and may have crusted, dried starter around the edges of your container.
Read More: How To Tell If Your Sourdough Starter Is Bad
Reviving Sourdough Starter
- Step 1: Remove the unfed sourdough starter from the fridge and allow it to rest at room temperature for 3-4 hours.
- Step 2: Look closely at the starter, discard immediately if your starter has mold, a pink/orange/red tinge, or smells musty, as these can be signs of contamination, so I don’t recommend trying to revive it.
If the starter passes the test, stir in the hooch, or pour it off.
Should I pour off the hooch or stir it in?
There are advocates on both sides of this debate. I prefer to stir it in, because I find (through very unscientific trials) that starters wake up better with the hooch stirred back in. I also believe that it helps keep my hydration percentage correct.
- Step 3: In a clean jar or container, mix 50g of the unfed starter with 50g warm water, stir until combined, then add in 50g flour.
- Step 4: Set aside the fed starter for 12 hours, then feed it again using a fresh clean jar, combine 50g starter, 50g water and 50g flour. Mark the side of your jar with the height of the starter. Watch the starter for signs of activity. It may be a little bit sluggish, but you should start to see a few bubbles here and there.
- Step 5: If the starter is close to doubling within 12 hours, wait 24 hours before feeding again. If the starter is not close to doubling by 12 hours later, feed it again – and repeat until the starter doubles within 12 hours, then reduce to a once every 24 hour feeding period.
- Step 6: Once the starter is revived and doubling regularly, it should be maintained on the counter and fed every 24 hours for 4-5 days. This will help get your starter healthy again before it’s placed back in the fridge.
- Step 7: Feed your starter weekly or bi-weekly once it’s in the fridge to keep it healthy and active.
How Do I Know If My Starter Is Ready To Bake With?
- It rises predictably after feeding
- It at least doubles within the expected timeframe for your feeding ratio and temperature
- It has bubbles throughout, not just on the surface
- It develops a domed top
- It smells pleasantly fermented
- It can repeat that same performance after consecutive feedings.
It’s Not Just You!
Other people have accidentally neglected their sourdough starter too! Here is what they had to say after saving their fermenty friends:
I was going to toss my sourdough starter thinking it I had to toss it. Thanks to this website I am reviving. This is the best site I have ever seen. Love the pictures and step by step instructions. This is now my source for all things sour dough.
– Dee
My starter would not rise and I needed an understanding and solutions. This article helped a lot!
– J
Expert Tips
- Don’t panic, feed it. A neglected starter can look rough after a long fridge nap, but ugly doesn’t mean dead. If there’s no mold or obvious contamination, give that fermenty baby some fresh flour, water, and a little time. There’s a very good chance you’ll be back to baking before you know it.
- Give it the once over. Before you start feeding, take a critical look at your starter. Hooch, separation, a strong fermented smell and generally sad appearance can all happen when a starter has been neglected. Mold or obvious spoilage is a different story. If something looks genuinely off, check my guide to figure out if your sourdough starter has gone bad and know when it’s time to let go.
- Stick with the usual. Try to feed your starter with the flour it was raised on. I like to keep it familiar when waking up sourdough starter. If you’ve always fed it bread flour, keep feeding it bread flour. The same goes for whole wheat, whole grain, all purpose, rye flour, or gluten-free. No need for a surprise party when your starter is already having a rough day.
- Mark the jar. Don’t always trust your eyes to tell you if your starter rose 25, 50 or 100%. A rubber band, a piece of tape, a hair tie, or a dry erase marker can make the rise much easier to track.
Why This Process Works
Yeast and bacteria slow way down. In a cold fridge, with no fresh food, there’s nothing to trigger the yeast and bacteria to feed and multiply, so they “hibernate”. Once the starter is refreshed with water and flour and moved to a warmer location, the microbes get the signal, loud and clear!
1:1:1 ratio lets microbes thrive. An unfed starter is basically starving, over time the bacteria and yeast consume the proteins and starches, leaving behind a sour, acidic environment. By using a 1:1:1 feeding ratio, you’re adding extra food and diluting the acidic environment. Over the first few re-fresh feedings you’re establishing a healthy balance.
Time is required. A 3-5 day window is pretty standard for reactivating sourdough starter. It takes time to wake up dormant starters, multiply enough to be noticeable and produce the bubbles and rise that tell you that it’s re-activated.
Reactivating Sourdough Starter FAQs
It depends on how neglected your starter was. If it doubled after a single feeding, it was probably in reasonably good shape. However, I do find that after a prolonged time without feeding, starters can double in the jar easily but lack the leavening power to raise bread.
I’ve done this in the past, and have been disappointed each time because my loaf was dense, flat, and bland.
My recommendation: Give it at least a second feed before baking, based on my experience.
You’ll need to discard all but 50g of the starter. The discarding portion is very important, as it allows you to feed the starter with the correct ratio without growing your starter exponentially, and it helps to quickly reduce the acidity in the starter environment.
Hooch (that grey liquid on top) is a sign that your starter is hungry, not that its bad. If it’s grey or smells like vinegar, that’s totally normal. Just keep feeding it on your regular schedule and it will bounce back.
The starter will eventually consume most of the proteins and starch in the starter then settle into a dormancy. The starter will likely generate a layer of hooch (grey liquid on top of the starter) and the environment will become more acidic. As long as the starter is not contaminated with mold or bacteria, it should be able to be reactivated.
You found your starter in the back of the fridge and have no idea when it was last fed. Could it be too old to save? Probably not!
Here’s what real readers have experienced:
* 1 year neglect: Michele left her starter in the fridge for almost a year without feeding it. She followed my revival process and it came back to life!
*5 year neglect: Lise had a COVID lockdown starter that sat untouched in her fridge for 5 years. She was skeptical, but followed the revival steps anyways. It took about a week, but her starter came back to life, happy and bubbly!
*3+ years frozen: Gary pulled a sourdough starter out of his freezer that had been there more than 3 years. His first few feedings were slow, but stuck with it and the starter came back.
What these experiences show: Starters can sometimes recover after surprisingly long periods of cold storage. Recovery time and success will vary depending on the condition of the starter, storage environment and how it responds to feeding.
Sourdough Starter Feeding + Maintenance
There’s a lot to sourdough, but there’s also not a lot to sourdough! One of the things you’ll have to decide is how often you’ll be baking. For me, in the fall and winter months, I bake much much more frequently. So I actually use different sourdough feeding and maintenance methods depending on the time of year.
Daily to Bi-weekly Baker
- you’ll want to keep your starter at room temperature and feed it daily. This will keep it warm and active whenever you’re ready for it!
- feed it around every 24 hours. You can play with the feeding schedule a bit, once you get to know your starter and how hungry it is. The starter should be fed after the culture doubles in size and deflates.
Weekly or Less Frequent
- keep your sourdough in the fridge! This slows down the fermentation time considerably and allows you to feed your sourdough only once a week.
- simply remove it from the fridge, then stir and feed, and rest for 12-24 hours at room temperature before starting with your recipe. Once the fed starter doubles, it is ready to use!
Want To Take A Longer Break?
Instead of leaving your starter unfed in the fridge indefinitely, you can freeze your starter or dehydrate sourdough starter for a long-term backup. These starter storage methods give you a safer “insurance policy” than relying on the jar in the back of the fridge.
Master Your Sourdough Starter In 5 Days!
From Confused To Confident.
Find success with 5 simple, actionable secrets delivered to you. No more guessing games - just clear, proven steps to a thriving starter.
Put That Sourdough Starter To Work!
If you tried this Guide to reviving sourdough starter or any other recipe on my blog, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. Thanks for visiting!
📖 Printable Recipe
How To: Revive Sourdough Starter
Ingredients
- 50 g unfed sourdough starter
- 500 g flour, divided
- 500 g water, divided
Instructions
- Remove the unfed sourdough starter from the fridge and allow it to rest at room temperature for 3-4 hours.
- Look closely at the starter, discard immediately if your starter has mold, a pink/orange/red tinge, or smells musty, as these can be signs of contamination, so I don't recommend trying to revive it.
- If the starter passes the test, stir in the hooch, or pour it off. I prefer to stir it back in, but it can be poured off too.
- In a clean jar or container, mix 50g of the unfed starter with 50g warm water, stir until combined, then add in 50g flour.
- Set aside the fed starter for 12 hours, then feed it again using a fresh clean jar, combine 50g starter, 50g water and 50g flour. Mark the side of your jar with the height of the starter.
- Watch the starter for signs of activity. It may be a little bit sluggish, but you should start to see a few bubbles here and there.
- If the starter is close to doubling within 12 hours, wait 24 hours before feeding again. If the starter is not close to doubling within 12 hours, feed it again 12 hours after the initial feed- and repeat until the starter doubles within 12 hours, then reduce to a once every 24 hour feeding period.
- Once the starter is revived and doubling regularly, it should be maintained on the counter and fed every 24 hours for 4-5 days. This will help get your starter healthy again before it's placed back in the fridge.
- Feed your starter weekly or bi-weekly once it's in the fridge to keep it healthy and active.
Video
Notes
How Do I Know If My Starter Is Ready To Bake With?
- It rises predictably after feeding
- It at least doubles within the expected timeframe for your feeding ratio and temperature
- It has bubbles throughout, not just on the surface
- It develops a domed top
- It smells pleasantly fermented
- It can repeat that same performance after consecutive feedings.
Expert Tips
- Don’t panic, feed it. A neglected starter can look rough after a long fridge nap, but ugly doesn’t mean dead. If there’s no mold or obvious contamination, give that fermenty baby some fresh flour, water, and a little time. There’s a very good chance you’ll be back to baking before you know it.
- Give it the once over. Before you start feeding, take a critical look at your starter. Hooch, separation, a strong fermented smell and generally sad appearance can all happen when a starter has been neglected. Mold or obvious spoilage is a different story. If something looks genuinely off, check my guide to figure out if your sourdough starter has gone bad and know when it’s time to let go.
- Stick with the usual. Try to feed your starter with the flour it was raised on. I like to keep it familiar when waking up sourdough starter. If you’ve always fed it bread flour, keep feeding it bread flour. The same goes for whole wheat, whole grain, all purpose, rye flour, or gluten-free. No need for a surprise party when your starter is already having a rough day.
- Mark the jar. Don’t always trust your eyes to tell you if your starter rose 25, 50 or 100%. A rubber band, a piece of tape, a hair tie, or a dry erase marker can make the rise much easier to track.
I have a starter that may be dead. It has been a couple of months since I used it. It would not raise, so I put it into my bread maker, added yeast and made dough and into a couple of loaves of bread that were really good. but, now I think it is dead. I may try to revive it, according to your directions..
Do it! Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Mine sat neglected in the fridge for over 4 months and it came back stronger than ever, so I say go for it!
@Ally, It was slow going for awhile (maybe because I make 100% whole wheat starter) but I’m glad I was patient, because this morning I was thrilled to see the starter finally doubled!
Now, a few questions, just to be clear:
1. For the 24 hour periods at room temperature, I should still use only 50g of the now doubled starter into a clean jar each time and toss the rest (even though it doubled)?
2. However, for the feed done right before putting into the fridge, I figure I should then take out 100g and mix it with 100g flour + 100g water because my bread recipe routinely calls for 150g starter per loaf. That way when I next make a loaf, I’ll have 300g in the fridge from of which I take out 150g for the loaf, leaving 150g to be fed a new.
3. BUT going forward, once the starter is revived and in the fridge, should I always feed it in equal amounts of starter/flour/water (1:1:1)? If so, that suggests I should always repeat step #2 above – feeding only 100g at a time and tossing out 50g, otherwise I’ll be creating a growing amount of starter going forward. Does that make sense?
4. I bake 100% whole wheat bread with Mark Bittman’s dutch oven method. His feeding regimen has you feed the remaining starter with the same *total* amount of flour and water as the starter you removed — so for example: if I take out 150g starter for the loaf, I feed the remaining starter with 75g of flour and 75g of water. That way, you don’t keep growing the amount of starter on hand and don’t have to toss any out. So that differs from step #3 of feeding equal amounts of starter/water/flour each time and tossing or using the excess.
BUT the fact is – after a year of doing Bittman’s method, my starter slowly fizzled out which is why I am now reviving it. I’m naturally wondering if the reason for the loss of activity was the lack of 1:1:1 feeding, as per step #3 above. What do you think?
Hi Jerry!
A quick thought on this results in these answers:
1. You can keep as much starter as you like – I like to use 50g because it tends to be the perfect size for me to store in a pint jar, have 60g for my regular sourdough recipe and enough leftover to feed 50g. You don’t need to toss the discard, you can store it, and bake with it!
2. I 100% agree with your thoughts on this. This is the perfect way to do it, to ensure that you always have enough on hand for your go-to sourdough recipe!
3. You’re exactly right here. I always feed my starter 1:1:1, and circles back to the reason that I only feed 50g. LOL Starters grow exponentially, so it’s important to keep a manageable amount on hand – hence the discard. That said, I find discard to be a misnomer because it can be saved and used in tons of recipes. It’s discarded in the sense of feeding the starter, but not necessarily tossed in the trash.
4. It’s very possible that the feeding method could have caused your issues. I can see what he’s trying to accomplish – a no-discard starter, but I think in order for the starter to stay healthy and viable, it needs to be refreshed by discarding.
I was going to toss my sour dough starter thinking it I had to toss it. Thanks to this web site I am reviving. This is the best site I have ever seen. Love the pictures and step by step instructions. This is now mysource for all things sour dough.
I got through step 4 and then my starter doubled in 8 hours and looks beautiful! Is there a reason I cannot just go ahead and start using it now? I’m confused about the next step: wait 24 hours and feed again. Is that necessary? Thanks for helping!
Hi Abi, I guess that depends on how neglected your starter was! If it doubled after a single feeding, it was probably in reasonably good shape. I find after a prolonged time without feeding my starters can double in the jar easily, but don’t always have the leavening power to raise bread. I have done exactly what you’ve done multiple times and was mad at myself each time because the loaf was not impressive – dense, poorly fermented, flat, and bland tasting. My opinion would be to give it a second feed before baking, based on my experience!
@Ally, ok thank you for explaining. But now that my starter is doubled and bubbly after two feedings, should I wait for it to fall again before feeding? You said wait 24 hours which is why I’m asking, still trying to understand. I’m used to the imperative need to use the starter asap once it’s doubled, making sure not to wait too long before it deflates. But you’re saying to let this one go for 24 and then continue to feed 50/50g? My starter was neglected for most of the year in the fridge!! So it’s confusing that it became seemingly active so quickly.
No problem! The 24 hours is just a rough guideline for feeding, you can go 36 or 20, whatever fits in your schedule. I never feed my starter until it has collapsed – if it’s still inflated it means that the yeast is still finding food – allow them to eat it all before you feed. It is important to use the starter when it’s at least doubled and active after a feed to bake with, but that is not necessary for feeding!
UPDATE! I did as I said and fed it with bread flour and it doubled in 7 hours! Back in business on a strict bread flour diet. 🙂
Ah! So glad to hear it came back!
Help! My daughter brought sourdough starter to me. It grew up on AP flour, then we fed it with bread flour and it was fine. Then we fed it with a different kind of AP flour and it’s not growing. THEN I read that you say not to change the type of flour. ;(. So. Now it is getting watery on top (is that hooch?). I am going to start consistently feeding it with bread flour. Will that work? Thanks!
howdy, i started reviving on sunday, still working on feeding every 12 hours, and it’s now thursday; smells/looks great so far, but i’ve not yet gotten any significant volume increase and it’s starting to make me nervous lol. also, should i be discarding before feeding? please and thanks in advance!
Hey Hannah, it should be pretty close – I’d try to feed it and wait 24 hours to see if you get a decent rise – it might just be slow! Yes you should be discarding and only feeding equal portions of starter, water and flour.
Am trying to revive mine today to get ready for winter baking. Mine has been in the fridge since April, I fed. It had greyish hooch and smell c like vinegar.
I used mostly rye flour, hope that is ok. Waiting to see what happened after 22 hours.
Thanks for your post. It’s very helpful!
It should be just fine! Good luck!
Ps. I’m happy we’re back in winter baking season LOL
Hi there! I’m so thankful you have this post! I’m reviving mine and I poured out the hooch and scraped as much off as I could. I fed it and 24 hours later, I now know it’s supposed to be 12, it was hoochy on top again. I fed it less than 12 hours today and it’s hoochy. Am I doing it right? Im doing equal parts of of starter, water and whole wheat flour. Do I need more water? This is what I’ve always done though but im wondering if I need more because I poured off the hooch.
The small amount of hooch you poured off won’t overly affect the hydration of your sourdough starter, eventually, it will get back to 100%. If the starter has hooch on top it’s cause it’s hungry, just keep up what you’re doing and it will bounce back!
Thank you for taking the time to share your expertise with us. It was very helpful.
when we let it sit, do we put a lid on it?
Thanks!
Yes you can put a lid on it, ensure it’s not airtight though!
Is there any discarding done at all during this reviving process? Thanks for your answer in advance!
Yes, you’ll be discarding all but the 50g of starter you use every day. You can save the discard in a container in the fridge and bake discard recipes, like in sourdough discard brownies!
Once I have my starter revived, how do I scale it up for bigger bakes? Do I use the same ratios of starter, water, flour in larger equal increments?
When you’re ready to scale your starter, add equal amounts of starter, flour and water! You could do 100g starter, 100g water and 100g flour – just be aware that it multiplies super fast so you can end up with way more starter than you need!
Your recipe calls for 500g of flour and water. That number seems way too high.
Hey Kelsie, the ingredients calls our 500g to ensure you have enough flour on hand to reactivate the starter – as some can be sluggish after a long famine. The directions within the recipe explain that you’ll only be feeding it 50g flour and 50g water at each feeding. Having 500g on hand means that you’ll have enough for 5 twice a day feeds or 10 daily feeds, but more likely a combination of both.
Hope that helps!
@Ally, definitely only saw 500g of flour and water under Ingredients, so that’s what I did (the whole time thinking, this just doesn’t seem right). However, my dormant starter loved it and doubled in 24 hrs! When I returned to the instructions to see what’s next, I saw where there were two sets of measurements. Once I read your explanation it made sense. Thanks for saving the sourdough day!
Oh my gosh! I am so sorry, I’ve edited the ingredients section to specify “divided” to be more clear!!
Super happy to hear that your starter loved the smorgasbord hahaha!
Hello!
What do you do with the original starter that you took the 50g from? Toss it?
Yup just toss it out!
@Audra, there are also great tossout recipes for the unused starter. I usually make overnight pancakes with mine
Thank you for this informative and detailed explanation. I am on my way to reviving my starter at this moment!
Good luck! Let me know how it goes!