Made me chuckle too although think they over-emphasise the effort needed to keep them going. Yes, it's a hassle initially but I just leave it in the fridge most of the time in a LocknLock tub. I've donated a few Sammies out so hopefully if he ever dies/goes mouldy/gets forgotten on the counter, I can recover him. I keep meaning to try Dan Lepard's suggestion of freezing some but haven't quite got round to it.

Sadly there are probably lots of rules about making bread that you then offer for sale that might scupper the idea of a community bakery. And also sadly, properly made bread can be pretty expensive compared to supermarket stuff unless you are making it.

girl_canuck - do you bake mainly rye/wholemeal with your rye starter? I have a mostly white starter (it gets a dose of rye every so often) but tend to bake a traditional white sourdough most of the time (pretty much Dan Lepard's white levain from the Handmade Loaf which is an excellent book)

Any good interesting yeast recipes out there - might be interesting to try my hand at something different when I next bake? This week's batch is now cooling with a pizza in the oven as we speak... Mmmmm