Rehydrating your Superstarter

A Simple, Confident Start to Your Sourdough Journey

Yeast Coast dried sourdough superstarter in a bowl with packaging and instructions on a blue background

If you’ve made it here, you’ve got your hands on our Yeast Coast Sourdough handcrafted dried sourdough Superstarter. That means you're just a few days away from a bubbling, active culture ready to bake naturally leavened sourdough bread.

This guide will walk you through reviving your dried starter and baking in four easy days. Let's demystify the process together. 

What you'll need:

  • A dried sourdough starter
  • A large glass jar with a loose-fitting lid or cover (I recommend the Weck 743 with the seal and clips removed)
  • A food scale 
  • A silicone spatula
  • Something to mark a jar with: a wet erase marker or rubber band

Day One: Wake-Up Call

Packet of dried sourdough starter being poured into a jar

Afternoon: Hydrate
Start by mixing your entire packet of Yeast Coast Sourdough Superstarter with 30g of room temperature filtered water in a clean glass jar.
Cover the jar loosely with a lid (glass or plastic are great, no metal), cloth, or plastic wrap and let it sit at room temperature for 3-4 hours. It should appear milky, and have some flecks remaining in the bottom.

Evening: First Meal
Add  50g of room-temperature filtered water and 50g of flour to your jar. (We recommend bread flour, but unbleached all-purpose works well too.)
Mix until you have a smooth paste. Loosely cover your jar again and let it rest overnight. This is when the magic starts.

Can’t do the midday hydration?If your schedule doesn’t allow for a midday hydration step, you can follow this alternate schedule:
Morning: Begin by mixing your full packet of Superstarter with 50g bread flour or unbleached all-purpose flour and 50g room-temperature filtered water. Cover the jar loosely with a lid, cloth, or plastic wrap and rest for 12 hours.Evening: Discard all but 20g of this mixture. Stir in 50g water and 50g flour, and replace your lid. Rest for 12 hours.
 This alternate approach is slightly less effective than the recommended hydration-first method, and your starter may need an extra day to become fully active before baking. But with consistent morning and evening feedings, it will still build strength and be ready to bake. You'll final starter will be just as strong: just give it a little extra time. 

Day Two: Feed & Build

Morning Feed
By now, your starter may be showing tiny bubbles. That’s a good

Starter jar showing surface bubbles
  1. Discard all but 20g of the mixture. (Yes, discard is part of the process to keep your starter healthy. See our notes below. Don't panic: the discard will be significantly reduced when you transition to the maintenance phase with your starter)
  2. To the remaining 20g of starter, add 50g water and 50g flour, and stir thoroughly.
  3. Mark the level with a rubber band or marker, cover loosely, and let it rest for about 12 hours.

This will be your feeding procedure for the duration of the rehydration process.

Evening Feed  
Repeat the same feeding steps you completed this morning: 

  1. Keep 20g starter, discard the rest
  2. Add 50g water + 50g flour
  3. Mix well, mark the level, cover loosely, and rest overnight.

By now, you should start seeing more bubbling and some rise. If your jar markings show that your starter is starting to gain some volume: great! That means it's on track. If you aren't seeing much activity yet, don't fret. You may encounter the "dilution lag", where your starter bubbles the first day then slows down and appears to go dormant. You haven't killed it; trust the process. 

Day Three: Strength Training

Morning Feed:
Continue the same routine:

  1. Retain 20g starter, discard the rest
  2. Add 50g water + 50g flour
  3. Mix well, mark the level, cover loosely, and rest 12 hours between feedings. 

Evening Feed:

Let's stop and assess our starter. Do you feel like it's:

  • Bubbly?
  • Doubled in size and starting to recede?
  • Tangy, yeasty aroma?

If the answer is no, complete the feeding cycle for another day. 
If the answer is yes, we are ready to prepare our starter to bake our first loaf!

If you are using my Simply White Sourdough Bread recipe (recipe included with your starter kit), you will need 120g of starter. Therefore, we will make 140g total: 120g to use, and 20g to keep your starter going. 

  1. Retain 20g starter, discard the rest
  2. Add 60g water + 60g flour
  3. Mix well, mark the level, cover loosely, and rest overnight.

If you plan to follow another recipe, follow the same process to create amount of starter listed in the recipe.

Day Four: Ready to Bake

You've done it! After three days of steady feeding and growth, your Yeast Coast starter should now be active, bubbly, and strong. You're ready to leaven your very first loaf of sourdough bread.

Go forth and bake your inaugural bread with confidence. Tag us on Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok @yeastcoastsourdough and #YeastCoastSourdough so we can give you a round of applause on your first loaf of bread from scratch! Questions? Email us at hello@yeastcoastsourdough.com. We’ll walk you through every step of the way.

Helpful Notes & Tips

  • What kind of flour should I use?
    Your starter will thrive on bread flour or unbleached all-purpose flour.
  • Why 50g? Isn't that a lot of waste?
    We’ve tested many feeding ratios to bring this starter to life quickly and powerfully. 50g of flour and water gives the ideal boost without overwhelming the reviving culture. It’s the sweet spot for speed, strength, and simplicity. We wouldn't call it waste: it's the key to rapid success!
  • Do I need to discard?
    Yes. Regular discard helps keep your starter healthy, strong, and manageable in size. The rehydration process creates more discard than you'll be making in your day-to-day starter maintenance. Remember: “discard” doesn’t mean waste: we just aren't maintaining it. Keep a large jar in your refrigerator and save the discard for a flavor boost in your other baked goods. Check out our Discard Recipes like these easy crackers for ideas to turn it into crackers, pancakes, waffles, cookies, muffins, and more.
  • What’s next?
    Once your starter is doubling reliably, you can transition to a daily or weekly maintenance routine. See our Starter Maintenance Daily Care Guide for details.
  • Why isn't my starter doubling yet?
    Especially in colder climates, you may require an extra day or two of feeding. Keep nurturing your starter every 12 hours and checking the level. If you are still not seeing activity after five days, email us at hello@yeastcoastsourdough.com. We will be happy to troubleshoot with you.

You’ve Got This.

We know it feels intimidating to start, but it only takes a few days to unlock a whole new world of baking. With Yeast Coast Sourdough, you're not just feeding dough. You’re feeding a rhythm, a process, a tradition.

And we’re with you every step of the way. Our goal is to demystify baking sourdough. Rest assured that we are just an email away at hello@yeastcoastsourdough.com if you have any questions. Because there's nothing we love more than talking bread.