Hi Elle, sourdough can seem confusing at first, but once you find a routine that works well for you and your starter, it's really not that difficult and can be both fun and delicious! Our Sourdough Baking Guide is a great place to begin your sourdough journey. If you already have a mature starter, typically you'll want to feed it at least once a week if you store it in the refrigerator. Depending on the recipe you want to make and how active your starter is, you may want to give it a feeding or two at room temperature after refrigeration to get your starter nice and active again (it gets a little sluggish in the refrigerator). Ideally you're looking for it to double in size within about 6-8 hours as a good sign that it is ready to raise your bread. Unless you're baking in a production setting, it would be extremely unusual for a recipe to call for 5 cups of starter. Most of our sourdough bread recipes call for one cup of starter, and our normal maintenance routine provides enough extra starter to make those recipes, with enough remaining to feed and perpetuate your starter. If a recipe calls for more than a cup, it's easy enough to build the quantity of starter during that last feeding before you plan to bake. For example, if your recipe calls for 2 cups of starter you can simply double the amount of water and flour you normally feed your starter to increase the quantity. Offering your starter a larger feeding like this won't hurt it at all, although it will slow down the ripening process a bit. For our starter routine a "double" feeding would look like: 1/2 cup (113g) starter + 1 cup (227g) water + 2 scant cups (227g) unbleached all-purpose flour. If you have further questions about sourdough baking, please don't hesitate to call our Baker's Hotline. We're here M-F from 9am-9pm EST, and Saturday and Sunday from 9am-5pm EST, and the number to call is 855-371-BAKE (2253). 

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