GREG’SPIZZA & BAGEL JOINT

CHARLESTON, SC Pizza. Bagels. Done Right.

GREG’S FREE PIZZA TOOLS · 03

Sourdough, poolish & biga calculator.

Choose your preferment. Get the ingredients for each stage of your pizza dough.

Total dough—See ingredients ↓

01 Your dough batch

Fermentation method

A levain made from your active sourdough starter. Its flour and water are included in the dough totals.

g

%

%

Total water ÷ total flour. Salt, oil, and sugar also use the total flour weight.

Oil & sugar
%

%

02 Your preferment

%

%

The share of ALL flour in the preferment, including seed starter flour. This is not the weight percentage of ripe starter.

100% hydration means equal weights of flour and water in the ripe levain.

Levain feeding settings
%

g

With a 100% starter and 100% levain, 5 gives a 1:5:5 feed by weight: starter, fresh flour, fresh water. Water adjusts when hydrations differ.

03 Yeast & fermentation

%

Final-mix yeast is a percentage of ALL flour. Leave at 0% for no additional yeast.

Changing yeast type does not convert the dose. Use percentages from a recipe written for that yeast.

Example settings are editable starting values, not a tested recipe. Use your recipe’s fermentation time and temperature. This calculator scales ingredients; it does not predict when dough is ready.

What does “flour fermented ahead” mean?

If your dough has 1,000 g of total flour and you choose 20%, the preferment contains 200 g of that flour. With a 100% hydration levain, it also contains 200 g of water: 400 g of ripe levain. A 20% flour share is therefore different from adding 20% starter by weight.

This calculator includes the seed starter’s flour in that percentage. Some recipes exclude the small seed contribution, so check the convention used by your recipe.

How are sourdough, poolish, and biga different?

Sourdough uses an active culture to build a levain. Poolish uses commercial yeast with equal flour and water weights, so its hydration is fixed at 100%. Biga also uses commercial yeast; this calculator starts at a stiff 45% hydration, which you can change to match your recipe.

Salt, oil, and sugar are added in the final mix here. For sourdough, keep some of your mother starter separately; the levain build makes only the amount needed for this dough.

General reference: King Arthur Baking’s guide to preferments.

Why do some settings produce an error?

Your preferment cannot contain more water than the whole dough. For example, 80% of your flour in a 100% hydration poolish already gives 80% overall hydration before any extra water. It cannot make a dough at 65% hydration without changing the flour share.

The levain build also checks the water carried in your seed starter. A very wet seed starter with little fresh flour may not be able to produce the stiff levain you selected.

Does this give a fermentation schedule?

No. Yeast type and dose, starter activity, flour, mixing, and temperature all affect fermentation. Match these inputs to a proven recipe and judge development with that recipe’s guidance. Switching between methods changes the example preferment settings, not the batch size or dough hydration.

A mathematical conversion does not guarantee the same rise or flavor. In flour mode, “total flour” includes the flour in both stages and in your seed starter. Dough hydration counts water; oil is separate.

Math reference: King Arthur Baking’s baker’s percentage guide.