Starter for 10

THERE’S something alive in my fridge. I’m keeping it in a glass jar. It squats right at the back like Philip Larkin’s toad work, an inch of greyish, aerated goo. I don’t mind admitting that it’s making me nervous.

The creature in question is a starter (also known as a mother or levain)—and if you’re one of the roughly 15% of UK consumers who’s had a go at baking sourdough recently, you’ll know exactly what that means. It was given to me by a neighbour, who made it by leaving flour and water to sit in a warm place for about a week to collect the wild yeasts floating in the