If you already have a traditional sourdough starter on your counter and want to try your hand at some Amish Friendship Bread baking, it’s easy to get an AFB starter going.
The Benefits of Using an Amish Friendship Bread Starter
- It’s ridiculously versatile. You can make over 200 recipes with 1 cup of Amish Friendship Bread starter.
- It’s easy to start (less chance of failure).
- It’s easy to maintain.
- It’s easy to “put on hold.”
- It’s easy to freeze the excess.
- It’s a great activity for young children.
- It’s not just a recipe, but a way of living. The heart of Amish Friendship Bread is sharing what we have with others.
Getting Started
You’ll need these ingredients:
- all-purpose flour
- sugar
- milk
- your existing sourdough starter (fed at 100% hydration)
And these kitchen supplies:
- large glass storage jar or mixing bowl
- wooden spoon
- gallon-size Ziploc bags to share/store excess starter
How to Convert a Sourdough Starter into an Amish Friendship Bread Starter
Day 1: Remove 1 cup fed sourdough starter at 100% hydration. Add to a large glass storage jar (we use these) or mixing bowl. Add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk. Mix well and cover loosely. Store in a warm area of your kitchen. Since you already have a mature starter, you skip to the front of the line — your Day 1 is considered Day 6 (refer to these original instructions if you’re confused).
Day 7: Stir or mix well.
Day 8: Stir or mix well.
Day 9: Stir or mix well.
Day 10: This is your first official baking day with your new starter. Congrats! Stir or mix the starter well. Feed 1½ cup each flour, sugar, milk. Mix well then divide into equal portions of 1-cup each (we use 1-gallon freezer bags for easy sharing and storage). Reserve one cup to bake with, one cup to leave on the counter, one cup to freeze for future or emergency use (i.e. if your spouse throws out the starter by accident, LOL). Share or freeze the remaining starter.
Maintaining Your Amish Friendship Bread Starter
Now that you have an Amish Friendship Bread starter, you can follow the regular 10-Day maintenance cycle. From this point on, you can remove a cup anytime to bake with. Just note that a handful of traditional bread recipes may need to use a recently-fed/active starter in order to properly rise, but the majority of recipes are ready and waiting for you. Have fun on your Amish Friendship Bread journey!
Tutorial – Making an Amish Friendship Bread Starter from a Regular Sourdough Starter
Ingredients
Instructions
- Day 1 (Day 6): Remove 1 cup fed sourdough starter at 100% hydration. Add to a large glass storage jar (we use these) or mixing bowl. Add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk. Mix well and cover loosely. Store in a warm area of your kitchen. Since you already have a mature starter, you skip to the front of the line — your Day 1 is considered Day 6 (refer to these original instructions if you're confused).
- Day 7: Mix well.
- Day 8: Mix well.
- Day 9: Mix well.
- Day 10: This is your first official baking day with your new starter. Congrats! Stir or mix the starter well. Feed 1½ cup each flour, sugar, milk. Mix well then divide into equal portions of 1-cup each (we use 1-gallon freezer bags for easy sharing and storage). Reserve one cup to bake with, one cup to leave on the counter, one cup to freeze for future or emergency use. Share or freeze the remaining starter.
Notes
When you start over after doing the process once, do you start at the day 6 mark again? or how do you keep doing this or how would you pass this onto a friend?
What does it mean that your sourdough starter should be fed at 100% hydration?
100% hydration means the sourdough starter was fed equal amounts of flour and water. So if you have 50g of starter, 100% hydration would be to feed it 50g of flour and 50g of water.
Hi there! How long can I leave on the counter and on the counter, how often should i feed? I currently have a traditional sourdough starter I feed daily. Or feed weekly if in the fridge. Thank you!
Hi, can I use Monk fruit instead of sugar?
Hi! I’m so glad I ran across this website. I have been looking for my grandmother’s sourdough recipe for nearly 20 years, and all I could tell anyone was that it was a soft, sweet bread, and that the starter used potato flakes. If I wanted to use this to make the potato flake sourdough starter, how would you suggest to go about doing that? Thank you for posting these recipes.
Currently, I use a gluten-free sourdough starter, but I would like to experiment with changing some of my discard starter into an AFB starter. Do you know if this AFB starter will work with an all-purpose gluten-free flour?
when using pudding can you use instant?sugar free??
Yes, you can use sugar-free instant pudding!
If using your own sourdough starter, does the AFB starter need to be fed with same kind of flour (unbleached bread flour) OR can any all purpose flour be used to feed the AFB starter? Thank you!!
Hi Sharon! You can use any all purpose flour to feed your Amish Friendship Bread starter. However, a lot of people have found that their starter react the best to King Arthur’s Flour (https://shop.kingarthurbaking.com/items/king-arthur-unbleached-all-purpose-flour-5-lb?gclid=Cj0KCQjw9_mDBhCGARIsAN3PaFMucXLSUi0ezLx2nqqtLlzGI4ob1KicVAynftDFGERfzrXuer7eyV0aAkwIEALw_wcB). Hope this helps!
It’s okay to leave milk in the recipe out on the counter? I hope that the sugar and the fermentation keeps it from going rancid. Thank you for the recipe
Hi Sandra! Yes, it’s safe to leave it on the counter!
Can I replace sugar with honey?
We haven’t tried the starter with honey, Karyn, but it should work fine! Let us know how it goes if you end up trying the starter with honey!
Can I reduce the proportions of the starter & recipe so that I can have a smaller amount?
Hi Karen! Great question — this post should help! https://www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com/keeping-a-smaller-amish-friendship-bread-starter/