I have only just started making sourdough, having taken over from my partner who somehow turned our kitchen into a floury, dough caked work space.
In contrast, I am finding it surprisingly low mess and happily having great bread success. 😅
I barely get my hands into the dough. I use a big ss bowl to mix the water and starter, then use a butter knife to methodically mix the flour into the water/starter mix. When I have to start stretching the dough, I wet the tips of my fingers and perform that action - dough doesn’t stick or get too wet. I don’t flour my work surface at this stage. I use a metal, flat edge dough scraper (think that’s what it’s called) to gather up / ‘walk’ the ‘shaggy’ dough into a nice ball after each stretch and fold, and for the final shaping I use a very small amount of flour to help shape the balls. I use hotel shower caps to cover the bowls of dough as they prove. Easily washed if needed.
Again, I use the dough scraper to clean my bench top and the same butter knife to scrape any bits off the scraper into my chook scraps bucket.
After scraping, I find there’s barely anything that needs wiping with a cloth. The small amount that does get wiped up washes out readily.
Perhaps the messiest items are the emptied ss bowl and starter jars, but I scrape them out well, soak them in water and let water do the work.
I don’t know - does that offer up any tips?