Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (2024)

If you have a sourdough starter, you understand the need (and desire!) to use it in creative ways.

When we first started making sourdough bread, we tried putting sourdough in all sorts of things without a recipe to use up the excess starter. While it was frugal, it didn’t necessarily always taste good!

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (1)

Since then, we’ve gotten a little better at it. It takes some practice, and trying out different recipes that were made for sourdough is a great way to learn how to incorporate it into your own creations.

While cooking is an art, baking tends to be more science based. By this, I mean that ingredients have to be added in specific proportions, otherwise the recipe doesn’t turn out correctly. Trying your hand at several of these excess sourdough recipes will begin to help you understand the formula for adding sourdough to your eats so you can try it out on your own sometime if you like.

I have put together the ultimate list of leftover sourdough starter recipes, which is full of amazing recipes to use up that starter! It includes everything from sweet to savory, so try out some of your favorite treats with a sourdough twist!

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First and foremost, check out my favorite sourdough bread recipe!

It is the BEST bread – all of our friends beg us to make it for them!The recipe also has a link to how to make a sourdough bread starter!

This recipe tends to make a super crunchy, hard crust.

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (2)

It is cooked in a dutch oven, with the lid on, at a very high temperature. While it tastes amazing, it can tend to be too hard for some to bite through. Plus, we often use an electric knife to cut through it!

But don’t let that stop you. If you try it out and it is too hard, try baking the loaf at a lower temp (such as 375) and in a regular bread pan for a softer crust.

Here is how we make it!

(If you don’t have a sourdough starter, click here for an easy, no yeast, recipe.)

This dutch oven is essential for making an amazing sourdough loaf with this recipe. The crust gets hard – just like a bakery loaf. If you don’t have one, pick one up!

And… how great is this set of bread making accessories?!? It comes with a proofing basket, a bowl scraper, a linen liner, and 10 adorable bread stencils. LOVE it!

If you’re totally set in the bread department, here is my ultimate list of leftover sourdough starter recipes!

There are so many amazing ways to use up that excess sourdough starter!

Adding sourdough starter gives your favorite recipes a rich complexity that you may not find in normal, white flour based recipes.

Morning Recipes

Blueberry Sourdough Muffins– Turnips 2 Tangerines

Morning Glory Sourdough Muffins – A Better Way To Thrive

Whole Wheat Sourdough Apple Cinnamon Muffins – Tasty Kitchen

Quick Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Sourdough Muffins – Cooking with Carlee

  • This is one of my favorite muffin recipes!!

Sourdough Spice Cake – Traditional Cooking School

Dangerously Addicting Sourdough Cinnamon Rolls – A Chick and Her Garden

Sourdough (raised) Doughnuts – cdkitchen

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (3)

Sourdough Hot Cross Buns – Nourishing Joy

Sourdough Bagels – Full of Days

Sourdough English Muffins – A Chick and Her Garden

Perfect Sourdough Pancakes – Joy To My Heart

Sourdough Banana Pancakes – The Dutch Baker’s Daughter

Whole Grain Sourdough Waffles – Traditional Cooking School

Sourdough Coffee Cake – Turnips 2 Tangerines

Sourdough Cinnamon-Pecan Coffee Cake – Cultures For Health

Blueberry Sourdough Scones – Wild Yeast

Sourdough (cake) Donuts – Baking Sense

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (4)

Sweet Bread Recipes

Stollen (German Sweet Bread) – Pizza Rossa

Sourdough Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread – What’s Cooking America

Sourdough Banana Bread – Pinch My Salt

Cranberry Orange White Chocolate Loaf – Korena In The Kitchen

French Chocolate Bread – Chocolate & Zucchini

Chocolate Cherry Sourdough Bread – NY Times Cooking

Cinnamon Raisin Sourdough Bread – Butter For All

Sourdough Swedish Cinnamon and Cardamon Buns – Milk and Honey

Dessert Recipes

Sourdough Brownies – Common Sense Home

Sourdough Sugar Cookies – What’s Cooking America

Sourdough Cookies (can add chocolate chips!) – Common Sense Home

Sourdough Snickerdoodle Cookies – Cultured Food Life

Chocolate Sourdough Cake – The Nourishing Gourmet

Sourdough Crepes – Homesteading on Grace

Sourdough Carrot Cake – Nourishing Joy

Pick up this huge glass flour canister to store your flour in!

Savory and Bread Recipes

Sourdough Crackers– Sourdough and Olives

Spelty Sourdough Crackers – The Bojon Gourmet

Sourdough Focaccia – Flour On My Face

Oatmeal Honey Sourdough Bread – Home Joys

Sourdough Tortillas – Reformation Homestead

Sourdough Cornbread – Tasty Kitchen

Sourdough Pasta – Korena in the Kitchen

Sourdough Pie Crust – Cultures for Health

Sourdough Pizza Crust – Butter For All

Sourdough Irish Soda Bread – Turnips 2 Tangerines

Sourdough Ciabatta Bread – What’s Cooking America

Sourdough Naan Bread – Grow Forage Cook Ferment

Russian Rye Bread – Mother Earth News

Buttery Sourdough Biscuits – Joy To My Heart

Einkorn Sourdough Sandwich Bread – Beets and Bones

Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread – Joybilee Farm

Final Thoughts on Excess Sourdough Recipes

One of the reasons that sourdough bread is so great is that it is more nutritious than normal white bread. This nutritional benefit can extend to these recipes too.

For example, while chocolate chip muffins taste great, adding oatmeal and sourdough starter to the recipe gives it a little nutritional boost (and that makes me feel better about eating them for breakfast!).

Some of sourdough’s amazing health benefits are:

  1. Sourdough is full of vitamins and minerals that regular bread doesn’t have (unless it is enriched). Sourdough contains iron, selenium, zinc, magnesium, folic acid and B vitamins!
  2. Sourdough has prebiotics and probiotics – meaning it increases your gut health. There is a big push in dietetics for foods that are good for your gut, such as yogurts, keifer and sauerkraut. This is because they increase the good bacteria in your digestive system. Check out how to make your own yogurt, how to make greek yogurt, and how to make sauerkraut for more gut healthy recipes!
  3. Sourdough has protein in it.

So, if you haven’t started making sourdough yet, get started! And if you are well versed in making sourdough bread, give some of these recipes a try!

What recipes did I miss in my ultimate list of leftover sourdough starter recipes? Share your favorites in the comments below!

Remember to pin this post for later!

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (5)

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List

Leftover Sourdough Starter Recipes: The Ultimate List (2024)

FAQs

What can I do with my extra sourdough starter? ›

10 ways to use up sourdough starter
  1. Sourdough crumpets. Add your sourdough starter to crumpet batter for a super light and airy texture. ...
  2. Sourdough crackers. ...
  3. Sourdough pancakes. ...
  4. Sourdough pizza.
  5. Sourdough scones. ...
  6. Sourdough focaccia. ...
  7. Sourdough toad-in-the-hole. ...
  8. Sourdough hot cross buns.

Do you have to discard sourdough starter every time you feed it? ›

Do I have to discard my sourdough starter? It would be best if you discarded some portion of your starter each time you feed it unless you want to continue to let it grow. Eventually, you need to discard the used “food” (flour and water) that's been used to sustain your starter during the last fermentation period.

What is the oldest sourdough starter ever? ›

In 2020, Seamus Blackley, the creator of Xbox and a seasoned baker himself, baked sourdough bread from dormant yeast samples that are 4,500 years old, according to the Atlas Obscura website.

Why do you throw away sourdough starter? ›

If you don't get rid of the excess, eventually you'll have more starter than your feedings can sustain. After a few days, your daily 1/4 cup flour and water won't be enough to sustain your entire jar of starter, and your starter will be slow and sluggish, not much better than discard itself.

What to do with sourdough starter when not using? ›

Store your starter in the fridge with a fitted lid on in between uses. Your starter stays happily dormant in the fridge, you will see just how magic it is when you take it out of the fridge and it looks sludgy and dull, and then it comes up to room temperature and you feed it and it bounces back.

Can you feed sourdough starter twice? ›

Discard a portion of the starter and feed it with fresh flour and water every 24 hours. Twice-Daily Feeding: In warmer environments or if you prefer a faster fermentation process, you can feed your starter twice a day, approximately every 12 hours. This helps maintain a more active and vigorous starter.

What happens if you forgot to discard sourdough starter? ›

If you didn't discard a portion of your starter each time you feed it, two things would happen: Your starter would grow to an enormous, unmanageable size. Your starter would likely become more and more inhospitable to the bacteria and yeast we want as the mixture would become ever more acidic.

How to tell if sourdough starter is bad? ›

If your sourdough starter exhibits any of these signs: - Smells like acetone or vinegar - Has a runny consistency - Is full of tiny bubbles or foaming - Doubles in size and then falls back down - Develops a clear, gray, or black liquid on top - Gets a white, powdery substance on the surface It's time to feed it!

Do you refrigerate sourdough starter discard? ›

Store it for future baking: You can store sourdough discard in an airtight container in the refrigerator for future baking with sourdough discard recipes. When you're ready to use it, let the discard come to room temperature before using it to bake. I will keep sourdough discard in the fridge for about one week.

What is the best flour for sourdough starter? ›

The best flour blend for creating a new sourdough starter is 50% whole-meal flour (whole wheat or whole rye) and 50% bread flour or all-purpose flour. I recommend a 50/50 mix of whole wheat flour and bread flour. Why do you need to use these two types of flour?

How does sourdough starter not get moldy? ›

Sourdough Starter Mold Prevention

Feeding your starter regularly cultivates a healthy colony of wild yeast and good bacteria, which maintain an average pH of 3.5-5, a level that inhibits the growth of mold spores and other pathogenic bacteria, such as botulism and E. coli.

Does a sourdough starter get better with age? ›

For most bakers, the answer is a clear no. Maurizio Leo, author of the award-winning bread cookbook The Perfect Loaf, still uses the first starter he ever made; it's now 12 years old. And while he's sentimental about that starter, he says its age doesn't really impact his bread.

Can I feed starter without discarding? ›

How to increase a starter. If your recipe calls for more than 227g (about 1 cup) of starter, feed it without discarding until you've reached the amount you need (plus 113g to keep and feed again).

Should I stir my sourdough starter? ›

It is important that you stir the sourdough starter every day in the morning and in the evening. Feed the starter. Add 60 g flour and 60 g lukewarm water, stir well to combine, and let sit out for 24 hours.

Can you skip a day of feeding your sourdough starter? ›

If you missed one feeding

Don't worry — your starter is fine. Just pick back up with your typical routine and your starter will settle in easily. To be safe, give it one or two feedings before you bake with it to make sure it's at full strength.

What happens if you use more sourdough starter? ›

The more starter you use, the faster your dough will ferment - resulting in a less sour loaf. Of course the amount of starter is actually a ratio in relation to the flour - so 50g of starter to 500g of flour will ferment at a much slower rate than 200g of starter to 500g of flour.

How do you store extra sourdough starter? ›

Storing: Crumble Into Dry Flour

This is by far my preferred method for long-term sourdough starter storage. Place a large dollop of your ripe sourdough starter in the bottom of a large bowl. Cover the starter with lots of flour—you can use the same flour used for feedings or 100% white flour.

What to do with sourdough starter after it doubles? ›

When the starter has close to doubled, refrigerate it and relax until the next time you want to bake. Try not to let the starter double and sit unfed for more than a few hours at room temp. Either feed it or hibernate it in the refrigerator.

What can I do with day 2 sourdough starter? ›

Day 2: Check for bubbles

Just leave it in a warmish place for another 24 hours. If a dark, smelly liquid has built up on the top of your starter (this is called hooch), don't worry. You'll pour this out tomorrow, but for now leave it as it is.

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