Hi Liz, we generally recommend keeping your discard for a week or two in the refrigerator, but this is for "mature" starter discard. Once your starter is mature the discard doesn't really go bad in the refrigerator very quickly, but it can get rather funky flavored over time.

However, I'm always a little reluctant to recommend using the discard from starter for the first few days (or until it begins to rise) because the normal creation process involves weeding out unhelpful bacteria (which can sometimes smell pretty bad). If your discard looks and smells okay it should be fine to use, since you'll no doubt be baking whatever you put it in, but you may also want to start "fresh" now that your starter is fully mature. 

Barb

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