Sourdough, using lots of flour...

[80sWaistcoat]

I've made a starter that's bubbling away and I've used half a bag of flour over five days, then you use a tblsp of stater to make the leaven. Then keep on feeding the starter or wake it up again if from fridge.

Don't you end up using lots of flour to keep the starter alive?

Sourdough is like having a pet cuckoo, it keeps eating flour and growing until your whole life revolves around making bread.
Eventually you discover a starvation diet for the starter, that keeps it at a constant size. Use about a quarter of the starter for each batch.

It has taken over my life rather and I haven't even made a loaf yet.

If you keep it in the fridge you only need to feed it once a week. When I was doing sourdough I'd have it in the fridge, take it out the day before I wanted to bake, feed it up til all bubbling and happy, bake with it, bit of a feed to get it through the week, then back in the fridge.

That sounds good, I think I'd read you had tofeeditup more than that when it came out the fridge. My kitchen is cold so I'm not sure it's bubbling up enough.

apparently you can freeze a sourdough starter. haven't tried it. I don't use it often enough, so it keeps dying on me.

My starter is about 1 year old, I forget exactly when I started it. Anyway, I get round to feeding it every other day. Sometimes every 3 days. If i know I am going to use it I might step up the feeds to one a day in the 2 days preceeding baking, so that it's stronger.
Sourdough is demanding and a bit of a discipline, but I have decided it's worth it for me because of the profound satisfaction I get out of taking a sourdough loaf out of the oven every week. Good luck!