Sourdough Starter Bacillus Bulgaricus Sourdough Starter makes an amazing sourdough bread of exceptional quality with great sourdough flavor, texture and taste. Our Sourdough Starter is super easy to activate, ferments quickly and is no trouble to maintain. It helps your sourdough rise fast and is very consistent and reliable. Bacillus Bulgaricus Sourdough Starter is different than the other sourdough starters available on the market. It contains colonies of lactic acid bacteria isolated from natural sources in ecologically preserved areas in Bulgaria including the famous Lactobacillus Bulgaricus. The starter activates very quickly ? because of the live active cultures and yeasts in it, it is ready to bake in as little as 1-2 hours after you feed it for the first time. You can of course feed it and let it ferment for as long as you need before you start using it, as you would do with your regular sourdough starter. Your stater will be ready to use when it becomes bubbly and doubles in size. Once activated, you can use it any time, without having to wait a certain period of time after feeding it. It?s full of beneficial probiotic colonies of lactic acid cultures and yeast strains, which keep it active and ready to bake for a long time. The starter is very sturdy and forgiving which makes it a great no-fuss, reliable and stable go-to sourdough starter for everyday use that is easy to keep going for as long as you need it. You should feed it regularly but if you forget, that?s ok ? it can survive without feeding for long periods of time, either in the fridge or at room temperature. So if you ever forget to feed it, or go away for longer periods of time, it would be just fine on its own. And if you ever need to start fresh, or bring it back to life, simply add some more starter to it, or quickly start a brand new fresh batch. Our Sourdough Starter gives the dough a reliable fast, strong and steady rise during proofing and it produces an excellent oven spring, yielding a superb sourdough bread with lots of air pockets, great open crumb, nice crust, just the perfect texture, and heavenly taste. This starter is not intended to replace the one you have been nurturing for many years at home. Its purpose is to give you an easy to use alternative, which you can use every time when you need to make a sourdough bread from scratch, even when in a hurry. It will also provide your sourdough with a boost of healthy gut-friendly natural lactic acid cultures that are generally not found in your local environment, like the famous Lactobacillus Bulgaricus strain. So even if you have your very own, years-old mature sourdough starter, get this one and use it whenever you don?t have time for a full several-days sourdough making cycle. Or for when don?t want to wait your own starter to activate after being in the fridge for too long. Or simply use it to top up and liven up your old sourdough starter with a boost of gut-friendly microbes. Bacillus Bulgaricus Sourdough Starter is a quickly fermenting and fast acting starter, but it by no means sacrifices on flavor. The starter contains a unique combination of lactic acid strains and yeasts that will make your bread taste heavenly and have all the healthy benefits of sourdough bread. From a health standpoint, the bread made with this sourdough starter is superior to other loaves. Not only the lactic acid bacteria and the fermentation help to break down the gluten, making it more digestible and easy for the body to absorb but it also boosts the natural occurring acids with colonies of gut-healthy strains, like the famed Lactobacillus Bulgaricus. It makes sourdough bread with excellent flavor even with minimal maturation. We know that sourdough is all about flavor and taste and that they naturally develop with slower rise and matured starters. That is why if you are into artisan baking and prefer to do a long fermentation, proofing, and slow rise in order to get that characteristic sourdough flavor and texture, you can nurture this starter for as long as you want to create a well-developed mature starter. Then give your dough all the time you want to rise and develop its flavors for a slow rise and classic sourdough bake. Just keep in mind that because of the added colonies of lactic acid cultures, the starter has a relatively quick proofing and fermentation time so make sure you account for this during your proofing and fermentation routine. You should get this starter if you are looking for a no-fuss sourdough starter with a fast rise, reliable performance and consistent results, which makes a great tasty full flavor sourdough bread with that characteristic tangy flavor, chewy texture and crisp, crackly crust. This starter will also help introduce colonies of beneficial lactic acid bacteria like l.bulgaricus, which you cannot naturally grow (unless your geographical location is in the vicinity of Bulgaria) and by using this starter, or adding the starter mix into your starter, will simply enrich the healthy gut microbe fauna and contribute to the nutritional benefits of your own starter. Make sure you always keep some packs in the fridge and use them when you feel the spontaneous need to bake. The starter is organic and fully natural with no preservatives, additives, artificial colors or flavors. It contains no GMO ingredients and it is gluten free. It is universal, which means if can be used with any flour ? AP, bread, whole, rye, spelt, even specialty flours. So there is no limit of the type of sourdough bread you can make with it. The starter provides you with a boost of probiotics. Each pack contains loose powder mix, in perfect proportions, of power probiotic strain colonies and yeasts indigenous to the same area of the world, which brought to you the Lactobacillus Bulgaricus strain. It is made with naturally sourced yeasts strains and lactic acid cultures, isolated from natural sources in ecologically preserved areas in Bulgaria. The colonies of friendly microbes will happily proliferate in your activated and live starter and will boost it?s natural local microbiome, providing the additional goodness and health benefits of Lactobacillus Bulgaricus for a healthy gut. Product Details Type: Universal and versatile. Use with all types of flour. Activity and Strength: 1 gram of starter contains at least 30 billion colony-forming unit (3.0 x 1010 CFU/g) of lactic acid probiotic bacteria and yeasts strains. 100% potency guaranteed. 100% viability guaranteed. Ingredients: Live active lactic acid cultures (incl. Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus bulgaricus), yeasts (incl. Saccharomyces Boulardii) Contents: This is an heirloom starter with freeze-dried live active bacteria and yeasts. Each sachet contains loose powder mix, in perfect proportions, of the strains required to make excellent live active sourdough starter (levain). The Sourdough starter comes in 6 gram packs. Packaging: Aluminum foil pouches, sealed. 100% recyclable. Plastic free. Label: Paper. 100% recyclable. Plastic free. Details: 100% natural, No additives, Gluten free, Soy free, GMO free, Halal, Kosher. Flour to use with: This starter is OK to use with any flour. Nutritional Information: Available here Lab test data: Available on request. Industrial size option: Available on request. Origin: Produced in Bulgaria. Storage DO NOT FREEZE. Store the Sourdough starter in the REFRIGERATOR. Use by the date indicated on the label. Bacillus Bulgaricus starters are shipped in sealed sachets. Transporting the packs (i.e. shipping them to you) at ambient temperatures (even in the warmest climates) is perfectly OK and will not damage the live cultures. We use a freeze-dried process that keeps the strains alive and comfortable even during long trips in hot weather. Once you receive your starter packs ? pop them in the refrigerator for best storage. 1-2 years at around 40F (4C) (in the fridge) Up to 1 year at ambient (room) temperature. Usage Use the entire pack at once, do not split its contents. The Sourdough Starter packs are intended for single use. How To Use Our Sourdough Starter It is super easy to make sourdough bread using our sourdough starter! All you need is a pack of our starter, some flour and water. Bacillus Bulgaricus sourdough starter is an universal starter, which means you can use it with any type of flour ? all-purpose, bread, white, whole wheat and rye, it always works! How to make Sourdough instructions. Sourdough Making Instructions It is super easy to make sourdough bread using our sourdough starter! All you need is a pack of our starter, some flour and water. Bacillus Bulgaricus sourdough starter is an universal starter, which means you can use it with any type of flour ? all-purpose, bread, white, whole wheat and rye, it always works! Sourdough bread making consists of two parts ? activating your sourdough starter (the one you got in the pack) to create an active sourdough starter (a levain), and then using this levain to make your bread. The two steps are explained below. Part I. Activating the starter In this part we will be activating the freeze-dried sourdough starter that you have in the pack you received from us. For this, you will need a container that you will use to activate and then keep your active starter (levain). Some people like to close their containers with a lid, I like to cover mine with a cloth but basically anything that you can cover so you can keep polluting particles out would work. 1 quart/liter or 1/2 quart/liter mason jars always work well for this. Make sure it is clean or simply wash it well and let it dry and come to room temperature if it is hot. Empty the Bacillus Bulgaricus Sourdough Starter sachet contents in the container. Add 75 g of flour and mix in with the starter powder. That?s about 4 tablespoons of flour. Note: Any type of flour is ok, however all-purpose, bread, white, whole wheat and rye, i.e. high gluten flours, work best. Some people prefer to stick to using the same type of flour to feed their starter as the one they would use for baking later on (i.e. white flour for baking white or san francisco sourdough bread, rye flour for rye sourdough bread, etc). Add 75 ml of water. That?s about 6 tablespoons of water. Stir well until you get a homogeneous mix with no lumps (some small lumps are ok). Note: The sourdough starter mix should have the consistency of a thick pancake batter or like that of oatmeal breakfast. No worries tho if it?s thicker or runnier, the starter is very forgiving and won?t mind it either way. Cover the jar (with lid or cloth). Note: Don?t give it an airtight close because feeding the starter mix produces CO2 so there might be pressure build up in the container if closed tightly (so if you do, watch out when you open it). Put the jar in a dark place (e.g. in your cupboard) at room temperature. The next day (or in the next 12-24 hours) repeat the feeding process ? feed the Sourdough starter mix again with 75 g of flour and 75 ml of water and mix well. Repeat this same feeding process every 12-24 hours until your stater mix is ready. Note: Your stater mix is ready to use when it becomes bubbly and doubles in size in about 2-3 hrs after feeding. At this point, your sourdough starter is activated and now you have a levain that is ready to use. Read how to keep your active starter alive and happy for as long as you?d like. Part II. Using the active starter to make sourdough bread Now that you have your live and active sourdough starter mix (the levain) you can use it to make sourdough bread or virtually for any baking that calls for using yeast or levain. The best time to use your active sourdough starter (the levain) is when it becomes bubbly and doubles in size. This should happen in about a couple of hours after feeding. With our starter this usually happens very quickly, about 1-2 hours after its very first feeding so you can use it straight away. It?s always a good idea to feed your starter for at least a couple of days so it ferments well and develops it?s raising power, flavors, and structure all of which consecutively contribute to making a superior sourdough bread. However, you don?t have to wait if you don?t want to or you are in a hurry. As soon as your starter is bubbly and has a pleasant tangy sweet smell, like that of fermented fruits, it?s good to go.