Sourdough Starter Workshop (Indoor - IPEC Bread Lab)

One hour. Hands-on learning. A starter to take home. You’ll leave with practical skills, clear guidance, and confidence you can use right away.

If your sourdough starter feels unpredictable, confusing, or hard to manage at high elevation, this workshop is designed to help.

Many bakers struggle with starters that:

• Rise sometimes, but not consistently
• Smell strange or change day to day
• Don’t behave the same at high altitude
• Look active but still don’t lead to good bread
• Come with too much conflicting advice online

This one-hour, hands-on workshop focuses on making your sourdough starter reliable and easier to understand, especially for high-altitude baking in Albuquerque and similar elevations.

Class Agenda (1 Hour)

1. What a Healthy Starter Looks Like
How to tell if your starter is active, what’s normal, and what’s actually a problem.

2. Feeding Without Guessing
When to feed, when to wait, and why consistency matters more than complicated ratios.

3. Flour, Water, and High Altitude
How ingredients, water quality, and elevation affect fermentation and starter behavior.

4. Hands-On: Feed and Reset a Starter
We’ll feed a starter together and talk through texture, smell, and rise.

5. What to Do at Home
A simple, repeatable routine you can follow with confidence.

What This Workshop Helps You Solve

• Stop guessing when and how to feed your starter
• Understand what your starter needs and what it doesn’t
• Adjust your routine for high-altitude conditions
• Recognize normal behavior vs real issues
• Feel confident caring for your starter at home

This workshop is about understanding, not perfection.

What You’ll Leave With

• A refreshed sourdough starter to take home
• A clear, simple feeding routine
• Better understanding of sourdough at high altitude
• Confidence that you won’t “kill” your starter

Bonus: As a bonus, you’ll also score, bake, and take home one loaf of bread. This gives you a chance to see how a healthy starter turns into real bread and leave with something you made yourself.

Who This Workshop Is For

• Beginners who feel stuck or unsure
• Bakers whose starter “kind of works”
• People baking at high altitude
• Anyone who wants sourdough to feel simpler and more manageable

No prior sourdough experience is required.

Good to Know

This workshop focuses on sourdough starters only.
If you want to learn the full bread-baking process, this workshop pairs well with our Basic Sourdough Class.

Our Approach

We don’t teach sourdough as a strict recipe. We teach you how to understand and care for your starter, so baking at home feels doable - even at high altitude.

Sourdough doesn’t need to be mysterious. It just needs to be explained clearly and simply.