I recently generated more than 2 kilograms of sourdough discard in a sourdough starter experiment. I didn’t want it to go to waste and I also didn’t have time to make anything complicated with it. So I found a recipe for crackers on the Little Spoon Farm blog that didn’t involve adding flour or rolling out dough. All the flour in this recipe comes from the discard and is full of fermentation flavor. You simply add oil, herbs and salt (cheese is optional), mix and spread the batter on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone mat. Ten minutes into the bake, you cut lines in the crackers — I used a curved pastry wheel — and then bake another 10-25 minutes depending your cracker thickness. It’s easy-peasy and the results are crispy and so delicious. In one day, I admit to grazing on an entire baking sheet of these crackers rather than eating lunch.
Fresh grated pecorino romano cheese gives an umami flavor on top of the fermentation tang, herbs, and good quality olive oil.
With the ingredient ratios given below, you can scale the recipe to the exact amount of sourdough starter discard you have. Details on how to do this are in the recipe notes.
300g sourdough discard makes almost enough crackers to fill a quart jar
Sourdough Discard FAQs: Sourdough starter discard should smell sour and may even have hints of acetone smell (nail polish remover). It should not smell yucky, musty, or have any fuzz-mold growing on it. The discard can be creamy in consistency or still have some gluten-stretchiness to it. Clear grey hooch/liquid on top is fine and can be poured off. Lately people have been asking if it is safe to use discard from early in the process of making a sourdough starter from scratch. In my personal experience, using discard that smells sour from day 5 onward is fine.
Easy Delicious Sourdough Discard Crackers
These crackers are an easy and scrumptious way to use up sourdough discard. They’re crispy and flavorful, with fragrant herbs and a tantalizing hint of pecorino romano cheese.
Servings
40-50 small crackers or 15-20 large crackers
Ingredients
- 200 grams sourdough discard (3/4 cup starter stirred down, larger if aerated)
- 28 grams oil or melted unsalted butter (2 Tbsp)
- 0.7 gram salt if you’re using cheese (1/8 tsp) — or — 1.4 grams salt if you skip the cheese (1/4 tsp)
- 5 grams finely grated pecorino romano or other cheese (1/4 cup, not packed down) A wetter cheese may weigh more at the same volume
- 1 gram dried crushed rosemary (1 tsp)
- 0.5 grams herbes de provence (1 tsp)
- Additional coarse salt to sprinkle on the spread batter just before baking
Baker’s Percentages * see the notes for how to use this information
- 100% sourdough starter discard
- 14% oil or unsalted butter
- 2.5% finely grated cheese
- 0.35% salt if you use cheese — or — 0.7% salt if you skip the cheese
- 0.5% dried rosemary
- 0.25% dried herbes de provence
- Additional coarse salt to sprinkle on the spread batter just before baking
Instructions
- If you make this recipe with 200 grams sourdough starter discard, it will fit a half sheet baking pan, which is typically 13×18 inches. The sheet in the photo gallery is larger (15×21 inches) and shows the recipe scaled up to 300 grams sourdough starter discard.
- Preheat the oven to 325°F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat.
- In a large bowl, add the ingredients and mix thoroughly. If your sourdough discard is dryer due to whole grain flour or another reason e.g. stiff levain build, add a splash of water. The ideal consistency for easy spreading is a thick pour off your spatula. See the photo gallery.
- Dump the batter onto the center of your baking sheet and spread it from edge to edge. An offset spatula is a good tool for this.
- Bake for 10 minutes. Keep an eye on the crackers and if you see the surface bubbling upward during this first stage, dock it with a fork.
- Remove the sheet from the oven and cut lines in the crackers. I used a pastry roller.
- Return the sheet to the oven and continue baking for 10-25 minutes, depending on the thickness of the crackers. Keep a close eye on the browning: rotate the baking sheet and remove corner pieces earlier if necessary. When the crackers close to being done (golden colored), break them apart along the cut lines, flip them over and return them to the oven for a few minutes more.
- Let the crackers cool completely on a rack and store in a closed container.
Notes
* Baker’s Percentage is a way to represent the ingredients of a recipe in relation to the amount of flour in the recipe. The flour is set at 100%. In the context of this cracker recipe, the sourdough discard is set at 100% and the other ingredients are in relation to it.
To determine the ingredients, you will multiply your discard amount by the percentages below.
- 100% sourdough starter discard
- 14% oil or unsalted butter
- 2.5% finely grated cheese
- 0.35% salt if you use cheese — or — 0.7% salt if you skip the cheese
- 0.5% dried rosemary
- 0.25% dried herbes de provence
For example, if you weigh your discard at 300 grams, you will do the following ingredient calculations. You can see for each percentage, I’ve moved the decimal place two digits to the left e.g. 14% becomes 0.14
300 x 1.00 = 300g sourdough discard
300 x 0.14 = 42g oil or unsalted butter
300 x 0.025 = 7.5g finely grated cheese
300 x 0.0035 = 1g salt — or — 300 x 0.007 = 2.1g salt if you skip the cheese
300 x 0.005 = 2.25g dried rosemary
300 x 0.0025 = 0.75g herbes de provence
