If you love sourdough like I do, but you’ve gone on a gluten-free diet, I have some great news for you. Yes, you can make gluten-free sourdough from this Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter and there are no special ingredients to buy!
I’m convinced that gluten is a big health concern for many, but I still love good bread. And while this flax bread is super tasty, there’s just nothing like a good sourdough.
We LOVE the tangy flavor of sourdough and since there are so many people who can’t tolerate gluten, I’ve been meaning to try my hand at making a gluten-free sourdough bread. I am now that much closer to my goal :)!}
In order to prepare myself for this post, I wanted to put myself into the shoes of someone who is gluten free.
When most people think “gluten-free,” they think that bread is no longer an option–particularly breads like sourdough.
So in order to be able to empathize with them in their struggle to balance nutrition with their allergies or intolerance… I did some “research.”
Basically I wanted to think about what it would be like to be gluten free.
And bread free.
So I ate bread.
Homemade bread.
Two pieces, actually.
With a lot of butter.
And I realized how much I would miss it if I weren’t able to eat bread like this on a regular basis.
I’m not trying to rub it in anyone’s face – quite the contrary! I know how fortunate my family is to be able to eat whatever we want without breaking out in hives or keeling over in digestive pain.
It saddens me to imagine what it would be like to:
– not be able to walk into my kitchen and slice off a piece of bread whenever I want
– request the waiter to remove the basket of bread instead of refilling it
– worry about being sick for days because someone accidentally contaminated a cooking spoon!
I think I can understand your pain.
That’s why it truly brings me joy to share with you a way to have your cake–er, bread–and eat it too.
Gluten-free sourdough, baby. Oh yeah.
Imagine capturing wild yeast out of thin air and cultivating it over a period of several days so that without any help at all, it will magically make dough rise and become a beautiful (and relatively inexpensive–) gluten-free loaf of bread.
It really isn’t as hard as it sounds!
But it is incredibly healthy! Quite possibly the healthiest bread you can make!
Benefits of Sourdough
There are many benefits to sourdough including:
Digestable
Sourdough is easier to digest than regular bread (preventing issues like indigestion, etc.)
Beneficial Bacteria
Sourdough contains the healthy gut bacteria lactobacillus (the same major player in yogurt and kefir)
Fewer Nutrient-Binding Qualities
Most of the phytic acid in sourdough is broken down, reducing the effects of nutrient-binders on other foods in your diet.
Lower Glycemic Load
Since sourdough takes longer to digest, it doesn’t cause as much of a spike in blood sugar as traditional bread does.
Sourdough is a Prebiotic
Since sourdough functions as a prebiotic, it helps support healthy digestion.
Reduced Acrylamide
Souring the dough reduces the amount of the amino-acid asparagine that is a precursor of acrylamide formation, and acrylamide is a cancer-causing ingredient found in toasted grains, including bread crusts. So with sourdough, you can enjoy your bread crust with less acrylamide.
Gluten-Free vs. Regular Sourdough
Making a gluten free sourdough starter isn’t any different than making a regular sourdough starter.
– Both start with flour and water.
– Both take a few days and both get bubbly.
– The only real difference comes when you’re ready to make sourdough bread and you have to pull out all the various types of gluten-free flours.
Gluten free sourdough starter can be made in as little as seven days using gluten-free flour, water and a medium-sized bowl. I personally have successfully made gluten free sourdough starter with brown rice flour, but I’ve read others have had success with white rice flour, teff flour, sorghum flour, or even a gluten-free all-purpose blend.
Typically, in the same way that using a blend of alternative sweeteners will work best when substituting for sugar, using a variety of flours will work best for your gluten-free sourdough.
Gluten-Free Sourdough Recipes
Following are a variety gluten-free sourdough bread recipes for you to experiment with. Because in all honesty, all sourdough breads – with or without gluten – are an experiment. A tasty experiment you can top with butter.
Keep in mind that every recipe will be different, calling for different types of flour and possibly using yeast. I’ve included several sources so that you can find something that suits you!
- Gluten-Free Brown Rice Sourdough
- Artisan Style Sourdough
- Sourdough Bread Boule
- Rustic Gluten-Free Sourdough
- Bread Srsly’s Sourdough
- An excellent bread recipe, plus recipe adaptations in Sourdough A to Z by GNOWFGLINS
- Bread Machine Sourdough – note that you can try to adapt regular recipes to bread machine, but here’s one that is done for you.
Grain-Free & Paleo Options
Since this post was published, several readers have asked if you can make sourdough starters without grains. Well, the good news, is–YES YOU CAN!
To do this, you will need at least 1/3 of your flours to be a starch like tapioca, arrowroot, or maybe cassava flour. Starch is what feeds the yeast so that is the reason behind this requirement.
Grain-free Sourdough Recipes
Here is a grain-free sourdough recipe for you to try after you have your sourdough starter ready to go:
Grain-free Sourdough by It Takes Time
There are other grain-free sourdough recipes out there but most call for a nut base. I hope to have some additional recipes for you in the future.
Recipe Notes and Substitutions for Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter
- Ingredient Amounts: The amounts we give in the ingredient list are the amounts you will need if you only feed the starter twice a day, which is the least number of times you should feed it. So if you feed it more often, you will of course need more flour and water.
- Flour: Gluten-free flour blends (just like with alternative sweeteners like stevia) tend to work best when used in conjunction with others. So it’s best not to try to make this sourdough starter or sourdough with only 1 GF flour. Personally, I recommend using a blend of flours. As you can read in this gluten-free baking tips post, using a blend of flours tends to make baked goods turn out better when using alternative flours.
- Grain-Free: For a Paleo Sourdough Starter or AIP Sourdough Starter, just use organic cassava flour or organic tiger nut flour in place of the gluten-free grain flours.
- THM: This recipe is an “E” for those on the Trim Healthy Mama plan.
Troubleshooting Your Starter
Here are a three of the most common things that you might notice while watching your starter and what they mean:
Too Much Starter
If after a few days the starter begins to outgrow the bowl, pour some off to make a batch of sourdough pancakes. Leave at least 1/2 cup of starter in the bowl to continue feeding.
Liquid At the Top
Liquid may or may not collect at the surface of the starter. Either case is normal. (FYI: the liquid contains more lactobacillus and gives the bread its sourdough taste.)
No Bubbles – If you do not see bubbles at the top or at the sides of the starter, add a third feeding. Try to keep the feeding intervals equal. For example, 6am, 2pm and 10pm are all equally apart at 8 hours.
Boost Your Starter
One thing you can do is to add one to two tablespoons of water kefir, dairy kefir, kefir whey or kombucha in place of the water for just one feeding. Since you are adding more bacteria “goodies” to the mix, you are boosting fermentation action.
How to Make the Starter
Following are some images and some brief info about how to do this. Full instructions are below :).
Step 1. Combine flour (whatever gluten-free flour or gluten-free flour blend you like) and water.
Step 2. Feed the Starter
Step 3. The sponge
Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter
Ingredients
- 6 cups gluten-free or grain-free flour
- 5 1/4 cups filtered water
Instructions
- Combine 1/2 cup flour (whatever gluten-free flour or gluten-free flour blend you like) and a scant 1/2 cup filtered water in a medium to large bowl.Whisk until smooth and cover the gluten free sourdough starter with a plate, leaving approximately 1/2" gap for air to circulate.Set the bowl in a warm area where it will not be disturbed. A kitchen counter, pantry cabinet, or patio will all work.
- Wait 12-24 hours.
- At least twice a day for the next six days, at regular intervals, add 1/2 cup of flour and a scant 1/2 cup of filtered water to the existing starter. Mix until smooth, and cover.This is called feeding the starter.Make sure to watch your starter carefully.
- When your gluten-free sourdough starter is very bubbly and creates a dome on top 2-3 hours after each feeding (like the above picture), you are ready to make bread. This is often called the sponge.
- Use your starter for making the sourdough bread of choice. See above this recipe card in the post for some great options!
Don’t Feel Like Making Your Own Starter?
I know how it goes. It’s exciting to think about doing everything yourself, but then you just might not get around to it.
If that’s how you’re feeling after reading this post, you can just buy this Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter and have it all done for you. Or, it would make a great back up to have in your pantry too!
(Adrienne here again. I think this is fabulous and a great jumping off point for tons of healthy creativity in the kitchen. I can’t wait to work on Gluten-Free Sourdough for my family. It would be great topped with butter (if you can eat it) or Homemade Nut Butter. Mmmmmm.)
Tiffany is a frugal foodie, balancing the desire to feed her family healthy food while being a good steward of her finances. She realized it was possible to eat nourishing, traditional food on a budget if she made baby-sized changes in the kitchen. She continues to work hard at mastering real foods without going broke and shares her journey at Don’t Waste the Crumbs.
Top Photo Credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/lizdavenportcreative/6778890399/
I’m trying this using only cassava flour and I noticed that equal parts water and flour don’t make for a slurry type consistency, it’s too dry. Is there a different ratio I should be using or a specific consistency to look for when using cassava flour as a starter?
Hi there. Yes, typically you can substitute cassava in 1:1 but it can absorb more water so not always. You might need to add more water.
What consistency am I looking for?
The photos in the post should help. I just had new images shot—do they help at all? Hope to have the new ones loaded soon.
how do you store the starter and how long does it keep for?
You can store it in several ways – dried, in the fridge or even frozen. In the fridge, about 2 months, but typically you would feed it weekly. Dried, for a long time – many years. Frozen, I didn’t find any good source on this but I would think it will work for a long time.
I made this with Bobs Red Mill 1 to 1 flour. I used Bread srsly recipe. It didnt work 🙁 too gummy. Suggestions?
I’m so sorry I haven’t tried that recipe but here are some questions to hopefully help out:
How long have you let cool for before cutting ? Are you baking by weight ? Are you using gum or husk powder? I assume “no” to the final question, but let me know and thanks.
I did let it cool. I did not bake by weight. No to gum or husk powder.
I’m researching for you. I’m hearing overhydration / overproofing is the most likely culprit – thoughts?
Other possibilities are:
The age of your starter, amount of psyllium/other “gluten replacement”, and lack of scoring.
I am thinking overproofing. I did try again with another starter a friend gave me and that worked better.
Great to hear!
These are all great tips, but I was wondering if you have a recipe that could be used in a bread maker?
Thanks! There are articles on the internet about how to convert regular recipes to bread machine recipes. I would try that. I don’t have a bread machine recipe personally but I just put a link in the post that looks good. Hope that helps!
My first time trying a starter. Many recipes I’ve seen they have you discard some before feeding. Curious why you do not do this step? Thanks for the help!
Mostly that is to keep the starter at a manageable size and not have to add too much flour to each feeding. It’s up to you but not necessary. It can help a little, perhaps, with even distribution of the flour into the starter, but again, not necessary. Hope it goes well for you!
I’d love to try this – but your post says look for recipes below the starter recipe – and there are no recipes. Could you please make it clearer where to go?
Hi there – I moved things around in the post–let me know if that’s more clear now. Sorry about that! We moved things around and missed that incorrect wording.
Fyi. On mobile it says see below for recipes, which aren’t there. I did see the bread recipes up top though.
Thanks – fixing this!
First time trying a starter here, wondering why you don’t discard any starter. I’ve read a few other recipes that discard some before feeding it starting on day 3. Thanks for the help!
Hi there. Discarding is mostly to make the amount of starter more manageable and perhaps to allow for more even distribution of the flour, etc., but it’s not necessary. Hope it goes well for you and sorry for the delay!
Good Morning. Do you keep feeding the starter the same way after the sixth day and you make bread or is it different?
Hi there. So do you mean how do you store it? Some freeze it, store in the fridge, or dry until ready to start feeding again. Does that help?
on the sixth day, when you make bread, do you keep feeding the starter every day the 1/2 cup of flour and water?
You do if you want to make more soon. Otherwise you store it in the fridge, freezer, or you dry it.
Could you please email the full recipe and directions for the GF version. For some reason it is not showing fully on the website or printing. Tks!
I did – hope it works for you!
Could you please email me the full recipe and directions. For some reason it is not reading or printing correctly.
Oh no- are you on mobile or desktop or tablet? I can help but please let me know what you are seeing so I can fix whatever I need to on my end. Thanks!
Your link for the premade sourdough starter actually links to their whole grain starter not the gf.
Otherwise, great read and I’ll try it!
Hi there – thanks for the alert! Should be working right now. I actually got a link that went nowhere….LMK if it’s fixed for you now and thanks again! Hope it goes well for you!
You mention grain-free flour as a possible ingredient. Do you know if this recipe would work with any combination of nut/seed/ and/or root flours? I have a lot of flours I work with in different combinations, but didn’t know if there was something specific they might be lacking in order for the starter to work. Right now my diet is even more restricted than usual so I could only use tiger nut, coconut, cassava, tapioca, arrowroot, etc – no nuts, seeds, or grains.
I think combining those would work almost for sure! I would try just one batch and see!
What is the rest of the GF sourdough recipe. It stops at #4.
Hi there! This recipe is just for the starter. There are links in the post to bread recipes. I just updated the recipe card to make that a little more clear. Does that help?
No dome yet. It is 6th day. Still have water on top. Do I keep doing this?
Hi there – sorry for the delay. Is it colored liquid or clear?
The liquid was clear. I did read about regular sourdough. It was suggested that I pour it off and that helped.
However, using any regular recipe failed as I think we need adjustments for gf.
I’ve noticed the other comment about the links going to a regular recipe. That is what failed.
I tried a few others and then threw out my starter. I would like to try again sometime.
Thanks!
Hi again. I’m not sure which recipe link isn’t to a GF recipe. I just checked the ones in the post and they all seem to be correct. There was a comment about the link to the premade starter going to a gluten-containing starter, but I just fixed that–it was going to a dead link. Can you tell me which link you see that is incorrect please? Thanks!
I’m sorry, I think it is my bad. I didn’t have the adjustments in the recipe so I used my bread flour gf mix. I think I would have to use all the individual flours that you had listed.
I think the only bad link before was the one that was corrected in another comment. I think I just need to practice making other bread before tackling sourdough again.
Sorry!
No worries of course!!!
Hi, my kids can’t have wheat, and me and my husband are keto, and vegan. I’m looking for a bread that would suit our new lifestyle that we are fairly new to. Would this gluten free bread fit all of our criteria?
Hi there. This might be a bit hard. I don’t know that there is a “regular” bread like that but possibly? I can try to make one. However, this flax bread done with chia eggs or gelatin eggs would work. https://wholenewmom.com/recipes/focaccia-flax-bread/. It’s a flat bread. I have done it w/ chia. It’s not as good as the egg replacer option but it works. Haven’t done it w/ gelatin yet. Hope that helps. It does taste great!
Anna if you did this with your own blend of coconut flour and almond flour it would work for the gluten free and the keto diet. (Gluten free blends generally have rice flour which you do not want on a keto diet)
This looks great! I have a large family so we would probably bake bread pretty frequently. After I use the starter the first time, do I leave 1/2 cup and start over feeding it twice a day? How often can I use it to bake something with after that? I’m new to starters!
Thanks
Yes, you would start over with the starter that you have left over. Potentially, your starter could last forever but you will need to change things up depending on how often you want to use it and discarding some of the starter will become inevitable at some point. I personally would use it for something else rather than tossing it!
What gluten free blend do you use? I’m reading so many mixed reviews!
Hi there. I typically make my own. I’m having a hard time with some too for cookies, etc. I have tried some that other bloggers use and they were terrible!! I am working on it! I would LOVE to hear what you try and how it goes for you!
Just an FYI that much of the problem is not gluten but Glyphosate or Roundup used on wheat to help dry it after harvest. It is poison and can be avoided by eating organic.
Yes, there are a lot of factors. Some can’t tolerate gluten no matter what but that glyphosate is a HUGE problem. Thanks for reading!
Just wondering how often you feed the starter after the 7 days? If I were to make bread every week. Do I just keep the same starter and keep feeding it?? And then keep making bread?
If you are thinking about making bread about once a week you can try keeping it in the fridge and just feeding it weekly. I would try that and see how it goes.