Sourdough Starter Found on Page 98 of my cookbook- It Just Happens to be Gluten-Free

Sour Dough Starter
I waited 20 years to make my first gluten-free sourdough and I don’t want you to wait that long to try it. I read tons of people opinions, articles, blogs and recipes and this is what I came up with… don’t judge yourself! Give the sourdough starter a try and you will be so happy that you did. Begin with brown rice flour and if you find this to be easy and you enjoy making this type of bread then you can branch out to other starters. The best advice I can give is to be patient and a bit forgiving of your learning process. I went from watching my starter take a week to feeding it enough and having a starter within. Once I told myself there was NO WRONG WAY of playing, I became obsessed!
Have FUN!
 
Ingredients:
Brown rice (I like to use fine)
Filtered water, room temperature
A towel
Mason jar or wide mouth glass jar
 
DIRECTIONS
1. To begin, weigh out 50 grams of brown rice flour and 50 grams of filtered room temperature water.
2. Mix together well and cover with a towel and secure loosely with a rubber band. I suggest using a wooden spoon for mixing. I suggest you don’t use metal because you don’t want to break the glass mason jar with your beautiful starter inside. If you are wondering if I did that, the answer is yes, that did happen. What a mess!
3. Place your starter in a corner of your kitchen that stays relatively warm (between 70°and 80°). The space shouldn’t be a drafty area.
4. Every 12 hours, check the starter and if you see bubbling and hooch developing (1) pour off hooch (2) add 40 grams of brown rice flour and 40 grams water. Mix. Cover. Store in a secure place. Each time it is fed it will grow.
5. Use your nose too! When you see bubbles throughout your starter and it has a sour smell with a hint of sweet, you have a mature sourdough starter! The perfect sourdough starter may take between 4-10 days. The starter will have doubled in size.
6. Use it in Gluten-Free Sourdough, page 101.
7. Once you have used it and have some starter remaining in the jar, begin the process again. Feed, mix, cover, repeat daily until it’s ready to bake with or store in the refrigerator.
8. When your starter is ready to store in the refrigerator, place a top loosely on the jar and place it in the back of the refrigerator to ensure it doesn’t get knocked over. The bacteria will continue to grow and need to be fed once a week. As I have read, and witnessed, the wild yeast will continue to rise just slower…like it’s sleeping. Feeding it once a week will allow you to continue to have a viable usable sourdough starter!
9. I like to have a few starters going because when you are allowing the wild yeast to grown and create that perfect starter, you are also going to need a decent volume. For example, my recipe calls for 250 grams. This can be tricky if you are feeding your starter a little at a time to build that perfect starter and you are impatient for MORE sourdough bread!  I always have a backup just in case I want/need a loaf quicker than it will take to build that the volume I need for another loaf of beautiful gluten-free sourdough bread with the perfect wild yeast starter.
 
Tip:
* You will soon become a PRO at knowing exactly the perfect consistency when you are feeding the starter. I believe you too will be like me and trust your gut with the amount of flour and water in order to achieve that smooth consistency that is not too watery like a slurry but more like a roux.
 
*I prefer a wide mouth jar 5.75” wide (.75 liter) (link for these jars) because it is easier to mix within the jar and scrape every morsel out when the time comes to use it or transfer it into another jar.
*Keep a log of when you fed the starter and how it responded.
*I read that too much “hooch” could mean over fermenting. Then I read on King Arthur flour website that it could mean you might not be feeding it enough. (The “hooch” is the liquid that collects on the top of your starter when it hasn't been fed in a while. It’s the liquid is the alcohol given off as wild yeast ferments.)
*Have multiple mason jars available to mix starter and transfer in to clean jars if needed. I did leave the starter in the same jar for several days and then when it became yucky looking on tope I transferred into another jar (scraping every tiny precious bit out)
*Make sure you have plenty of the flour on hand to be able to feed your starter and watch it grow. The higher protein flour work well for making a sourdough starter. I
* Once it goes into the refrigerator, I take a sharpie or stick up note and write the date of the last feed right on the jar. Or keep a note on your refrigerator.
*I have found that I have very little “pour off” with the hooch if any. many people say to reserve the pour off for pancake or another baked good item. That is a great idea. In the beginning of your starter process discard it. Once it is growing, you can even pour some off and begin another starter for yourself or a friend!