I was intimidated to make my first loaf of sourdough bread. I’d heard others talk about flat and dense loaves—dough that never rose. It wasn’t until I read a sourdough book cover to cover and painted it with post-it notes, highlights, and dog-eared pages that I felt ready to put my newborn sourdough starter to work. I bought flour. I filtered water. I measured. I mixed and kneaded. I folded ever-so-gently while I held my bread until, hours later, I pulled my first sourdough from the oven.
I had my wife taste it. “Pretty good,” she said. “Yeah, pretty good bread.” Only later did she fess up that it was “actually just okay, to be honest.” But all-in-all the bread had a nice rise, a crunchy and well-colored crust, and it did taste great considering it was my first loaf of any kind of bread. And you know what? We ate the entire thing.
This Beginner’s Sourdough Bread post has several videos where I walk you through each step of the sourdough bread-making process. Be sure to see the end for a complete video walkthrough of me making this recipe!
As the new obsession set in, I started making fresh sourdough bread for every meal. There was something about the whole bread-making process that I found captivating. It was–and still is–exciting to mix such elemental ingredients and to see them produce beautiful, life-giving sustenance: it is modern-day alchemy. It’s such a simple thing, and yet it brought me so much joy to see my family and friends tear into a freshly baked loaf that I wanted to bake every day of every week.
This recipe will give you confidence as you take your first steps in baking sourdough bread from your home kitchen.
Starting to make your first loaf of sourdough bread can be daunting. That’s why I’ve put together this beginner’s sourdough bread tutorial and recipe—it will give you confidence as you take your first steps in baking sourdough bread from your home kitchen. This how-to guide starts with explaining baking terms and definitions so that we will have a common vocabulary once we get to the recipe.
And then, each step of the process has lots of information to ensure you understand what is happening and what to do. But, before we go on this beginner’s sourdough bread recipe, let’s first take a look at what sourdough bread is.
What is Sourdough Bread?
Sourdough is a specific type of bread created through a natural fermentation process involving suitable bacteria and wild yeasts in the environment (i.e., the air and even a baker’s hands) and, most importantly, on the grain itself. A sourdough starter culture is used to seed fermentation in new dough when making sourdough bread.
Generally speaking, bacteria are primarily responsible for producing organic acids (lactic acid and acetic acid) that contribute to sourdough bread’s flavor, texture, and storage qualities. The wild yeasts produce carbon dioxide gas and ethanol during fermentation. When this gas becomes trapped in the dough’s airtight gluten matrix, the dough begins to rise, resulting in a final loaf of bread with a light and airy texture.
All recipes on The Perfect Loaf are naturally leavened; in other words, you won’t find any commercial yeast or instant yeast here. There’s nothing inherently wrong with commercial yeast, but I prefer to make bread this way because of the wonderful flavor and texture, the health benefits like increased bioavailability of minerals and nutrients, increased keeping quality thanks to the acids generated during natural fermentation, and the fact that it requires so few ingredients (just three!) to make something so delicious.
For a high-level look at each step of the sourdough process, read through the Beginner’s Guide to Sourdough Bread →
Creating a Sourdough Starter
It all begins with a sourdough starter. Before we look at how to make sourdough bread, you need to create a healthy sourdough starter that shows consistent signs of fermentation each day. Creating a sourdough starter is easy: mix flour and water for a few days in succession, and eventually, thanks to the bacteria and wild yeasts on the grain, natural fermentation will begin.
If you’d like to look at how I feed my starter daily, look at my sourdough starter maintenance routine. In this guide, you will see the visual and aromatic cues to look for when your starter is ready for refreshment (feeding).
While waiting for your sourdough starter, let’s look at some terms bakers often use to discuss the various parts of the bread-making process.
Baker’s Terminology
Sourdough starter
A starter is a mixture of flour and water you allow to ferment naturally. You’ll refresh (feed) the starter indefinitely to keep the fermentation active and healthy, and you will wait for it to become fully ripe before you use any of it to make bread.
When you want to make bread, you take a small amount of your starter to create an off-shoot called a levain (see below). See my post on starter creation to read more about the starter and learn how to make one.
Levain (or leaven)
A levain is made by mixing a small off-shoot of your ripe starter with water and flour and allowing it to ferment before mixing it into a dough. You can always use your starter directly to make sourdough bread, but a levain is a small off-shoot that allows you to adjust the flour, hydration, and ripening schedule (which have implications on the bacteria and wild yeast balance).
Also, unlike your sourdough starter, which lives on as its own entity, the entirety of the levain goes into the dough and has the same fate as the bread itself: to be baked in the oven. See my post on what a levain is and how it’s different from a sourdough starter for more information.
Autolyse
Some recipes utilize a step called autolyse (“auto-lease”). It occurs at the beginning of bread baking and is a step in which only flour and water are mixed together and left to rest. The goal of autolyse is to initiate enzymatic activity in the dough to help draw out sugars from the flour. Additionally, it helps increase dough extensibility (the ability for the dough to stretch out without tearing).
In most cases, increased extensibility is good as it helps the dough expand and fill with gasses, resulting in a light and airy loaf. See my in-depth post on the autolyse technique for more information.
Bulk fermentation
The dough’s first rise is called bulk fermentation. After mixing the flour, salt, and levain into a dough, you put it all into a bowl or container, cover it, and let it rest. The dough will undergo a fermentation process during this critical step. Bacteria and yeast begin to generate organic acids and alcohols and leaven the dough, which will translate to flavor and rise in your final bread.
For more on this critical step in the bread-making process, see my in-depth guide to bulk fermentation.
Proofing
The proof is the dough’s final, or second, rise after the dough has been divided and shaped and lasts until the dough is finally baked in the oven. During this time, the dough continues to ferment, further strengthening and leavening it. I typically proof at a cold temperature in the refrigerator (also called “retarding”).
In my ultimate guide to proofing, I talk about how to spot when the dough is finished rising and ready to bake, plus a whole lot more.
Final Dough Temperature
The final dough temperature (FDT) is the dough’s temperature after mixing all ingredients. The dough’s temperature is important because it’s the main factor that affects fermentation strength: a warmer dough will ferment faster than a cooler dough.
Naturally, each component (levain, the flour, the water, and the ambient environment) has a temperature. While most of these are out of our control, we can easily adjust the water temperature, which enables us to change the FDT of the entire dough to meet whatever the recipe calls for.
I have a handy water temperature calculator you can use to quickly figure out what you need to warm or cool your mixing water to get the dough to the right temperature.
Or, so you don’t have to do any calculations, here’s a quick cheat sheet for this Beginner’s Sourdough bread recipe:
| If your kitchen temperature is | Warm or cool the mixing water to |
|---|---|
| 68°F (20°C) | 98°F (37°C) |
| 70°F (21°C) | 94°F (34°C) |
| 72°F (22°C) | 90°F (32°C) |
| 74°F (23°C) | 86°F (30°C) |
| 76°F (24°C) | 82°F (28°C) |
| 78°F (25°C) | 78°F (25°C) |
| 80°F (26°C) | 74°F (23°C) |
If your kitchen is outside of these temperatures, my guide on the importance of dough temperature in baking will walk you through calculating exactly what to warm (or cool) your mixing water to so your dough meets the FDT for any recipe.
Baker’s Percentages (Baker’s Math)
Baker’s math, or baker’s percentages, helps bakers adjust the actual quantity of the ingredients up or down, depending on how much bread they want to make. I write all the formulas on The Perfect Loaf in baker’s percentages, where all ingredient weights are a percentage of the total flour weight, which always adds up to 100%. Read through my introduction to baker’s percentages for a more in-depth explanation (including how to scale up and down a bread recipe).
TPL Members (the baking community here) have access to all the recipes here at The Perfect Loaf in spreadsheet form, making scaling up and down recipes as simple as changing a few numbers.
Baking Tools
There are a few necessary tools for baking your first loaf of this beginner’s sourdough bread. The following might look like a long list, but you probably already have many of these in your kitchen—There are a few tools necessary for baking this beginner’s sourdough bread. Note that one item is absolutely necessary: a kitchen scale. If you don’t have a kitchen scale, please consider buying one. Measuring flour with cups and scoops is entirely inaccurate!
- combo cooker like a Lodge 3qt. cast iron combo cooker or a Le Creuset Dutch oven that can withstand 500°F (260°C) in the oven and has a well-sealing lid
- large mixing bowl to mix your dough by hand
- two medium kitchen bowls to proof your dough
- two kitchen towels or a tea towel to line the proofing bowls
- bench knife to cut and shape the dough
- plastic or silicone bowl scraper
- kitchen scale that measures in grams
- instant-read thermometer
- white rice flour for dusting proofing bowl
- blade for scoring your dough (a “lame”), or a razor blade, sharp knife, or scissors
- fine-grain sea salt
- parchment paper
- pizza peel (or cutting board)
- heavy duty oven mitt
- the best bread knife for cutting your sourdough bread
You can find a full list of all the tools I use when baking on my baking tools page.
The Importance of Dough Temperature
When I first started baking, I didn’t quite grasp how important temperature is in the bread-making process. I always like to say: Treat temperature as an ingredient, just as flour, water, and salt are ingredients. What I mean by that, practically, is that if one day you mix with water that is 70°F (21°C) and then a week later mix with water that is 80°F (26°C), you will get drastically different outcomes.
Temperature determines the amount of fermentation activity you’ll see. Lower temperatures generally mean less activity; therefore, things will take longer. Higher temperatures generally mean more activity; therefore, things will take less time. Working with consistent temperatures will ensure consistency in your bread baking, and you’ll get the desired results in terms of flavor, rise, texture–well, everything.
Treat temperature as an ingredient, just as flour, water, and salt are ingredients.
If it’s cold where you’re baking, see my tips on how to bake sourdough bread in the winter. And conversely, if it’s warm where you are, see my post on how to bake in the summer. These guides will help ensure your loaves have the best flavor and volume.
Flour For Baking Bread
I used commonly available supermarket flour for this recipe: Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour, Bob’s Red Mill Whole Wheat Flour, and Bob’s Red Mill or Arrowhead Dark Rye Flour. These are great flour choices, but any of King Arthur’s offerings are equally suitable. I chose “bread flour” as it has a higher protein percentage than all-purpose flour, which helps bring significant strength to the dough so that less mixing and kneading is required–it also makes things a bit easier for your first loaf of bread.
As you’ll hear me mention throughout this site, I do like to use as little high-protein flour in my recipes as possible as I find it leads to a slightly chewier, gummy interior—or be sure to use it in the correct way.
Baking Schedule
This beginner’s sourdough bread is a two-day-long process where the bread is mixed and prepared on day one, cold-proofed (retarded) in the fridge overnight, then baked on day two.
I love the convenience of this type of schedule: most of the work is done on the first day, then the dough can be left in the fridge until the next day, when it can be baked in the morning, afternoon, or even the evening.
The baking schedule to the right shows you a high-level view of what step takes place and when.
Beginner’s Sourdough Bread Formula
Now we get to the formula for the beginner’s sourdough bread formula. I start every recipe with two tables: Vitals and Total Formula. The Vitals table gives you a high-level view of the contents of the dough, as well as how much the recipe makes (in this case, two loaves). The Total Formula table lists the ingredients needed for the entire recipe and their respective amounts.
Vitals
| Total Dough Weight | 1,800 grams |
| Pre-fermented Flour | 7.5% |
| Levain in final dough | 20.3% |
| Hydration | 72.0% |
| Yield | Two loaves |
Total Formula
| Weight | Ingredient | Baker’s Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| 811g | Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour | 80.0% |
| 152g | Bob’s Red Mill Stoneground Whole Wheat Flour | 15.0% |
| 51g | Bob’s Red Mill Dark Rye Flour | 5.0% |
| 730g | Water | 72.0% |
| 18g | Fine sea salt | 1.8% |
| 38g | Ripe sourdough starter, 100% hydration | 3.8% |
Beginner’s Sourdough Bread Method
1. Levain – 8:00 a.m.
| Weight | Ingredient | Baker’s Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| 38g | Ripe sourdough starter (100% hydration) | 50.0% |
| 38g | Bob’s Red Mill Stoneground Whole Wheat | 50.0% |
| 38g | Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour | 50.0% |
| 76g | Water | 100.0% |
Remember: the levain is an off-shoot of your continually maintained sourdough starter and is likewise composed of bacteria and yeasts. You make this levain well before you mix the dough, so it has time to ferment, and eventually, it’s added to the dough to seed fermentation.
Mix the ingredients in the table above in a clean jar (I use the same sourdough starter jars) and leave it at warm room temperature, 74-76°F (23-24°C), for 5 to 6 hours. When it’s ready, it will be expanded, bubbly on top, inside, and at the sides, and have a slightly sour aroma. The photo below shows my levain before it goes into my dough mix.
2. Autolyse – 12:00 p.m.
| Weight | Ingredient |
|---|---|
| 773g | Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour |
| 114g | Bob’s Red Mill Stoneground Whole Wheat Flour |
| 51g | Bob’s Red Mill Dark Rye Flour |
| 603g | Water (this has 50g less than the overall formula, reserved for Mix step below) |
The desired dough temperature (DDT) for this dough is 78°F (25°C). As described in the temperature section above, we will try to get the dough to this temperature right at the end of mixing (which is also at the beginning of bulk fermentation).
Warm or cool the autolyse water so the mixed dough reaches the FDT for this recipe. Place the flour and the water called for in the table above in a large bowl. Use wet hands to mix until no dry bits remain; the dough will be shaggy and loose. Use a bowl scraper to scrape down the sides of the bowl, keeping all the dough in one area at the bottom. Cover the bowl and place it near your levain for 1 hour.
Note that the autolyse stage does not incorporate salt or the levain in any way since the autolyse is a long one hour. Adding the levain to the autolyse would mean fermentation would begin, which could end up overproofing the dough. Salt is rarely added to an autolyse because the salt would diminish enzymatic activity during this time, which is precisely why we are doing an autolyse. The autolyse and levain are two separate entities that will be mixed together later in the process.
3. Mix – 1:00 p.m.
| Weight | Ingredient |
|---|---|
| 50g | Reserved water (this water was held back in the Autolyse step) |
| 18g | Fine sea salt |
| 190g | Ripe, 100% hydration levain (from Levain, above) |
Use your instant-read thermometer to take the dough’s temperature and compare it to the FDT for this recipe. If it is higher, use cold water for the reserved water; if it is lower, use warm water.
At this point, your autolyse is complete and your levain is ready—it’s time to mix and strengthen the dough. If the dough feels very wet and shaggy, do not use all of the reserved 50g of water; use only a splash to help incorporate the salt and levain. If the dough feels good to you, use all the reserved water.
To the autolyse, add the ingredients in the table above (salt, reserved water to help adjust dough hydration and consistency, and levain). I like to spread everything on top of the dough and use wet hands to pinch all the ingredients together. Transfer the dough to a container or thick-walled bowl for bulk fermentation.
Take the temperature of the dough to get your final dough temperature. If your FDT is below 78°F (25°C), next time use warmer water, and conversely, if it’s above 78°F (25°C), use cooler water. Cover the dough.
4. Bulk Fermentation – 1:10 p.m. to 5:10 p.m.
At 74-76°F (23-24°C) ambient temperature, bulk fermentation should go for about 4 hours. Perform 3 sets of stretches and folds during bulk fermentation, spaced out by 30 minutes.
Each set of stretches and folds consists of 4 folds: one each at the North, South, East, and West sides. Wet your hands with a little water to prevent sticking, and then lift one side (North) of the dough with two hands. Stretch the dough high enough so you can fold it completely over to the other side. Rotate the bowl 180° and do the other side (South). Finish the other two sides (East and West) to complete the set. Let the dough rest for 30 minutes, covered, between sets.
In the video below, you can see how I stretch and fold this dough during bulk fermentation.
After the third set of stretch and folds, let the dough rest for the remainder of bulk fermentation. During this time, fermentation aerates the dough (making it rise), continues to strengthen it, and further develops its flavor.
At the end of bulk fermentation, your dough should have risen by 20% to 50%. It should show some bubbles on the top and sides, and the edge of the dough where it meets the bowl should be slightly domed, which indicates strength. In the photo above, you can see all these signs. If you don’t see these signs, leave it for another 15 minutes in bulk fermentation and check again.
5. Divide and preshape – 5:15 p.m.
Lightly flour a work surface. Using a bowl scraper, gently scrape the dough onto the work surface and use your bench knife to divide the dough directly in half. Using your bench knife in your dominant hand, and the other hand wet (or floured, if you prefer) to reduce sticking, turn each half of the dough on the counter while lightly pulling the dough towards you. This gentle turning and pulling motion will develop tension on the dough’s top, forming a circle.
Preshaping bread dough is an often overlooked step, but it sets the stage for successful shaping later. See my guide to preshaping bread dough for more information.
Let the dough rest for 25 minutes, uncovered.
In the video below, you can see how I preshape this beginner’s sourdough bread dough:
6. Shape – 5:35 p.m.
If you’re new to shaping bread dough, check out my guide to shaping a boule (a round) in addition to the steps below.
Lightly flour the top of your dough rounds and the work surface. Working with one round at a time, flip the round so the floured top is now down on the floured work surface.
As seen in the image below, with lightly floured hands, grab the bottom of the round and stretch it lightly downward towards your body, and then up and over about 2/3 of the way to the top.
Then, grab the left and right sides of the dough and stretch them away from each other. Fold one side over toward the other and repeat with the other side.
Then, grab the top of the circle, stretch it away from your body, and then fold it down to the bottom of the dough. You’ll now have a tight package that resembles a letter.
Finally, flip or roll down the dough so the seams are all on the bottom. Using both hands, cup the top part of the round and drag the dough gently towards your body to create surface tension on the dough. The angle of your hands will gently press the dough’s bottom on the counter. This dragging helps create surface tension on the dough, which helps keep it in shape during proofing.
Let the dough rest on the bench for a few minutes to help the bottom seam seal.
In the video below, you can see how I shape bread dough into a boule shape.
Meanwhile, prepare your proofing baskets. Line two proofing baskets, kitchen bowls, or bannetons with clean kitchen towels. Dust lightly and evenly with plain white flour or white rice flour. Gently transfer each piece of shaped dough to a proofing basket, seam-side-up.
You can also top this dough with sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, pepitas, and much more—see my guide to topping bread dough for more ideas and instructions.
7. Rest and proof – 5:40 p.m. to 9:30 a.m. (next day)
To prevent your dough from drying out overnight, place your bowls containing your shaped dough into reusable plastic bags and seal. I usually puff up the plastic bag around the bowl by opening it wide and then quickly closing it.
Let the dough rest on the counter for 20 minutes. Then, retard (a baker’s term meaning place into a cold area to proof) in the refrigerator at 38°F (3°C) for 16 hours (overnight).
During this time, overall fermentation will slow (especially yeast activity), but bacterial activity will continue at a reduced rate, resulting in a more complex flavor and, ultimately, deeper crust coloring.
8. Bake – Next morning: preheat oven at 8:30 a.m., bake at 9:30 a.m.
Now, it’s time to bake your sourdough bread. It’s not a difficult step, but there are some things to know. The oven needs steam for the best crust and tallest rise. I like to use a Dutch oven or combo cooker, which is very easy. These pots trap the steam released from the dough and provide the right environment for it to rise optimally.
See my full guide to baking sourdough bread for tips on scoring your dough, pots, and steaming.
Place an oven rack in the bottom third of the oven with no rack above it. Put your combo cooker or Dutch oven on the oven rack, and preheat the oven to 450°F (232°C) for at least 30 minutes. If you’re using a combo cooker, place the shallow side face up on one side and the heavier, deep side face down on the other.
When your oven is preheated, remove one of the proofing baskets from the fridge, uncover it, and place a piece of parchment paper over it. Place a pizza peel, cutting board, or inverted baking sheet on top of the parchment and, using both hands, flip everything over. Gently remove the basket; your dough should rest on the parchment.
Using a razor blade, sharp knife, or baker’s lame, score the dough at a 90° angle between the blade and the dough. I chose to make a “box” pattern. If using scissors, snip the dough a few times at a very shallow angle between the scissors and the dough, forming a set of ridges down the dough’s center.
While wearing your heavy-duty oven mitt, and with caution, pull out your shallow side of the combo cooker and place it on a heat-safe rack or stovetop. Slide the dough into the combo cooker or Dutch oven. Place it back into the oven and cover the shallow side with the deep side, or put the lid on the Dutch oven. This sealed environment helps trap the moisture (escaping steam) from your dough to steam the loaf exterior as it bakes, which encourages maximal rise and a crunchy, shiny crust.
Bake for 20 minutes. Vent the oven of steam: use your oven mitt to very carefully remove the top of the combo cooker or Dutch oven. Leave the large side of the combo cooker in the oven to the side. Close the oven door and bake for 30 minutes more. When done, the loaf should have an internal temperature of around 208°F (97°C), and the crust should be a deep mahogany color and crackle/crunch when squeezed.
Use your oven mitt to transfer the bread to a wire rack carefully. Cool for 1 to 2 hours before slicing into your beginner’s sourdough bread. For the second loaf, preheat the combo cooker or Dutch oven for 15 minutes and repeat.
Follow my guide to storing bread to keep your loaves fresh for as long as possible.
Once you get the hang of this beginner’s sourdough bread process and formula, you can endlessly modify it with add-ins like walnuts, cranberries, seeds, and a host of other ingredients bound only by your imagination. But the most important thing is to bake and have fun. Remember that sometimes bread doesn’t come out as you intended–but stick with it, and you’ll be rewarded time and time again.
And of course, buon appetito!
Watch me make this Beginner’s Sourdough Bread from start to finish
In my YouTube video below, you can see how I make my Beginner’s Sourdough Bread, from creating the levain to slicing the final loaves.
Beginner’s Sourdough Bread Recipe
- Prep Time: 23 hours
- Cook Time: 1 hour
- Total Time: 24 hours
- Yield: 2 loaves
- Category: Main course
- Cuisine: American
Description
The perfect bread to get started baking sourdough bread at home. This crusty, crunchy, and absolutely delicious loaf of bread is perfect for any lunch or dinner table.
Ingredients
Levain
- 38 grams stoneground whole wheat flour
- 38 grams bread flour
- 76 grams water
- 38 grams ripe sourdough starter
Main dough
- 773 grams bread flour
- 114 grams whole wheat flour
- 51 grams whole grain rye flour
- 653 grams water
- 18 grams fine sea salt
Instructions
- Levain (8:00 a.m.)
In a small container, mix the levain ingredients and keep at 74-76°F (23-24°C) for 5 to 6 hours. - Autolyse (12:00 p.m)
In a medium mixing bowl, mix the flour and 603 grams of water (reserve 50 grams until the next step). Cover and let rest for 1 hour. - Mix (1:00 p.m.)
To the mixing bowl holding your dough, add the salt, ripe levain (from step 1), and reserved 50 grams water. Mix by hand or with a dough whisk until incorporated. Transfer your dough to a bulk fermentation container and cover. - Bulk Fermentation (1:10 p.m. to 5:10 p.m.)
Give the dough 3 sets of stretch and folds at 30-minute intervals, where the first set starts 30 minutes after the start of bulk fermentation. - Divide and Preshape (5:10 p.m.)
Lightly flour your work surface and scrape out your dough. Using your bench knife, divide the dough in half. Lightly shape each half into a round shape. Let the dough rest for 25 minutes, uncovered. - Shape (5:35 p.m.)
Shape the dough into a round (boule) or oval (batard)—place in proofing baskets. - Rest and Proof (5:40 p.m. to 9:30 a.m. the next day)
Cover proofing baskets with reusable plastic and seal shut. Let the dough sit out on the counter for 20 minutes. Then, place both baskets into the refrigerator and proof overnight. - Bake (Preheat oven at 8:30 a.m., bake at 9:30 a.m.)
Preheat your oven with a combo cooker or Dutch oven inside to 450°F (230°C). When the oven is preheated, remove your dough from the fridge, score it, and transfer to the preheated combo cooker. Place the cooker in the oven, cover with the lid, and bake for 20 minutes. After this time, remove the lid (you can keep it in the oven or remove it) and continue to bake for 30 minutes longer. When done, the internal temperature should be around 208°F (97°C). Let the loaves cool for 1 to 2 hours on a wire rack before slicing.
Notes
While the recipe calls for 16 hours of total proof time, you could extend this time and bake the loaves in the morning, afternoon, or even the evening on day two. Leave the proofing dough in the fridge until ready to bake.
Beginner’s Sourdough Bread Frequently Asked Questions
Why is sourdough bread good for you?
Sourdough, and its lengthy natural fermentation process, can help break down the gluten in grain, which helps aid in the body’s digestion. Additionally, fermentation helps “unlock” the nutrition inherent in the grain, allowing for better absorption.
Is sourdough bread sour?
Sourdough isn’t super sour in the traditional sense—it’s not sour like taking a bit of a lemon. But it does have tanginess which is the byproduct of lactic acid fermentation. Sourdough bread will have more sourness than one made with 100% commercial yeast due to the acids created by natural fermentation.
How can I make sourdough bread more sour?
To increase the sour flavor of this sourdough bread, add more whole grains (both to your sourdough starter and the dough itself), keep the dough warm (78°F/25°C or warmer), and lengthen the total fermentation time by keeping the dough in the fridge to proof even longer than the 16 hours specified in the recipe—24 hours is a good starting point.
How can I get a more open crumb with my bread?
First, focus on your sourdough starter to get a more open crumb for this sourdough bread: it should be refreshed (fed) often, kept warm, and used when ripe. Next, strengthen the dough sufficiently during mixing and bulk fermentation by using stretches and folds. Finally, your dough must be fully proofed so that when you press a finger into the dough, it slowly springs back about halfway (if it springs back quickly, let it proof longer; if the finger indentation stays, bake immediately).
What’s Next?
After baking this beginner’s sourdough bread, check out my Baking Guides for more in-depth discussions on all parts of the sourdough bread-making process. If you’re looking to add mix-ins to your bread, have a look at my walnut cranberry sourdough bread—it’s one of the most popular recipes here at The Perfect Loaf—and for good reason! Or, have a look at my Simple Weekday Sourdough Bread for a way to squeeze sourdough bread baking into a busy workday.
Finally, now that you have your sourdough starter bubbling away on your counter check out my sourdough starter discard recipes for ideas on how to use leftovers!
3,336 Comments
Hi Maurizio,
Have you baked any of your loaves in a cold combo cooker or dutch oven? It seems that folks at King Arthur and thefreshloaf.com haven’t found any difference baking in cold dutch oven versus in a pre-heated one. That doesn’t make sense – wouldn’t a cold pot with such a large mass use up a lot of heat to get hot and then start radiating that heat to the dough inside? In any case, just curious if you’d tried it and what your experience was? It would make loading a lot easier! Thanks! If I try it I’ll report back.
I have never baked with a cold Dutch oven, I’ve always preheated it. I agree with you, it would seem like the cold DO would take too long to get up to heat and compromise oven spring in your loaves. Can’t be sure though since I’ve never tried it! Let me know if you do 🙂
Hi Maurizio,
Great blog! I am loving all your helpful photos and explanations. I have a few questions I hope you can help me with. I would really like to make a predominately whole wheat loaf and have been using the whole wheat recipe from the Tartine book (70% whole wheat, 30% white). I’ve made it a few times and it is decent but the crumb is a bit dense and the loaves are on the small side. Reading your comments here, you seem to really suggest starting with the mostly white loaf and moving on from there. I would really really prefer mostly whole wheat, so do you have any suggestions for what to pay attention to when starting this way? Also, I’ve been thinking about adding a bit of gluten to my whole wheat flour to lighten it up a tad – any thoughts on this? Finally, I’ve been doing the overnight proofing because that schedule works best, but I want to confirm that the dough does not rise at all in the fridge. Your loaves look so soft and lovely when coming out of the fridge and I don’t know if they are rising at all or it’s just the difference of white to whole wheat dough.
Thanks for your help! Amanda
Thank you Amanda, I appreciate that! First off I wanted to say that I hope to have some more recipes coming soon that have more whole wheat/whole grain flour in them so keep an eye out for those.
The reason I recommend people start with more white flour is just so they get a feel for the process and then from there they know for what to look for at each step, can do everything easily and comfortably and then move on. I don’t think this is necessary by any means and if you’d like more whole wheat then that is totally fine — personally I love recipes with more whole wheat in them. Tons of flavor.
The biggest thing to be aware of with recipes that have a majority of whole wheat is that they will ferment much faster than a mostly-white dough. When making these recipes I like to usually reduce my levain percentage (instead of something like 20% ill go down to 15% or so) or expect to bake with a shorter proof time than what I list here. Just watch the dough and not the clock, as they say. If it looks like your dough is fermenting faster than what you’d expect shorten the timeline.
I’m not sure what effect the added gluten would have (I’ve never used it) but you could, instead, use 30% “Bread” flour instead of “all purpose”, this would give you more strength in your dough if that’s what you’re looking for. I don’t think this will solve your dense loaf issue, though, but it might be worth experimenting with.
Your loaves could be dense for a number of reasons but at the start you should expect your bread to be a bit more on the dense side when compared with mostly white loaves. This doesn’t mean your bread will be any less flavorful (in fact I find it more flavorful) or light and airy, it just means you won’t quite get the same rise and structure. If your loaves are very, very dense and gummy then it could be that they are under-proofed and need more time in the fridge or a little extra time in bulk fermentation. I would find this hard to believe, though, as I said whole grains usually ferment much faster. The interior of your loaves should look uniformly open (i.e. uniform holes throughout) without any gummy spots.
I usually do not see too much rise coming out of the fridge either, I wouldn’t worry to much about that. My fridge is set to 38ºF but if yours is very, very cold (like 32-34ºF) then that would certainly slow things down too far. You could let your dough sit in final shape in their proofing baskets on the counter for 30m or so before tossing them into the fridge to counter any really cold temperatures.
I hope those comments help! If you’re still having issues feel free to shoot me an email (Contact link at top) with some pictures of your next bake and we can explore further. Have fun with it, the outcome is (almost) always edible 🙂
Thanks for your help! My latest loaves were much lighter – still a thick heavy crust and a bit gummy, but I’m still only a handful of loaves in to bread baking. I’ll have to comb through your blog for ideas on those issues. 🙂
Hi Maurizio,
I love your blog like so many others! I have made your beginners sourdough recipe several times and my results are always slightly different but delicious. My last loaves though, while looking beautiful were a bit gummy inside. Here I thought I was really getting the hang of it, as every step of my last bake seemed so much better than all the rest. Any thoughts on what I could have done wrong? I do not proof overnight, but do a 4 hour counter proof, to fit my schedule. Thanks, Kristie
Kris — thank you! Usually a gummy interior is due to under baking. Do you have an instant read thermometer? Next time you do this bake (carefully) insert the thermometer through the crust and see if the interior temperature is around 210º-212ºF. If the exterior is turning dark before the interior gets fully cooked you might have to reduce the temperature by 10-15ºF at each step so the outside doesn’t bake before the inside.
If you don’t have a thermometer try it out anyways, just try to extend the baking time a little longer so your loaves fully cook. See if that helps and let me know! Happy baking 🙂
Thanks for the tip! I do have an instant read thermometer that I can’t live without lol! I will try reducing the oven temp as you suggested as my crust was dark and beautiful. Could the amount of salt or type of salt make a difference? I just used table salt, and measured everything with my scale. Our climate here in my part of Canada sounds very similar to yours, except for the elevation, and I feel your recipe has worked great so far. I know my perfect loaf is out there somewhere, and I have taken great inspiration from your blog and instragram posts! Thanks for taking the time to help out me 🙂
You know, I have actually only ever made bread with sea salt. I prefer the taste and buy it in bulk so I’ve just always used that. I would assume table salt would work just fine but you could try sea salt sometime and see if you notice a difference (probably not). Just make sure you get fine sea salt, it needs to readily dissolve in water.
You’re very welcome, thanks again for the comments and keep at it!
Hi Maurizio! I hope these next few questions don’t come off as redundant if you’ve answered them already, feel free to shoot me down to a comment below, if so! First off, killer blog. You’ve saved many a premature grey hairs for me upon discovery- took me ages to figure out that my starter was failing simply because I was underfeeding! Duh. Thank you thank you. My question today- I have followed your beginner sourdough recipe to a tee, but now realize I won’t be able to bake my loaves the following day until much later, say around 4 pm. For this bake off, will they be over-proofed, ie with not as much as an oven spring? Or just with a more pronounced sour flavor. For the future, if my schedule doesn’t allow for me to bake my loaves after the 16hr cold proof, can I substitute with maybe a 4 hour room temp final proof, then bake? Or if I wanted to do an overnight cold-final-proof, dial back the water temperature in the dough for the bulk proof?
I am trying to figure out the best way to handle timing issues… I hope that makes sense, thank you!
Also- when you say dial back hydration level if the dough is too wet for what I am capable of handling, is it as simple as just not adding as much water to the flour, but everything else would remain the same (amount of flour, levain, salt…) And same for increasing hydration? Or am I misunderstanding the bakers math then?
Okay, that’s all for now… I know I will be back. Thank you so much for taking the time out!
Aiyana — thanks for the kind words, really appreciate that! You’ve probably already baked off the loaves you mentioned but for future reference, yes you can definitely extend the length of your cold proof in the fridge. How long you can push it depends a lot on the temperature of your fridge, how active your dough was when you placed them in and also the flour you’re using. I find the flour used here in this recipe can take a pretty lengthy fermentation, but like you said, the end result may be a bit more sour and as it nears the maximum proof-time it will star to exhibit a more sluggish rise (as the provided food wanes and gluten breaks down). Personally I really like the taste of a very well fermented dough so this isn’t a problem for me, as long as you don’t go so far that it comes out more like a pancake and less like bread 🙂
You can definitely use cooler water for your mix, and this would slow bulk down, but remember you still need to do a full and complete bulk fermentation step otherwise your dough will not have sufficient tension in it for shaping. Fermentation, and the produced organic acids, help strengthen the dough during bulk (as do your stretch and folds) so you still want to see the same signs I mention above in this post (rounded edges, etc.). When I want to extend my proof time I like to reduce my levain percentage a few points to slow things down, you could reduce this 1-2% to see if that helps. Honestly what I’d try first is just do a test batch and see if this dough can last the time you’re looking for before making changes — you might be surprised! Also, you can definitely do a room temp proof and bake it when it’s ready instead of doing a cold proof. The flavor profile will be different but you might prefer it this way (should be less sour). 4 hours might be a good duration, it depends on ambient temperatures and how active your dough is. Gently poke the dough occasionally and when your poke slowly comes back to fill close to the original surface of the dough it should be ready to bake (this is called the “poke test”).
Yes, “dialing back hydration” just means adding less water. You could keep all else the same and just reduce the amount of water at mix time.
I hope all that helps, I know it’s a lot to process. Let me know how it goes and happy baking!
I have wanted to try making artisan style sourdough breads at home for years, but always been shy to dive into this complex world. Lots of reading over the last few years, but no action. Two weeks ago I started building a starter using Donna Currie’s post on Serious Eats. The part about never discarding any starter drew me in. I made the levain one morning, ready to bake bread the following day, but when I saw pictures of the resulting bread, I bailed. Wimpy blond loaf with boring uniform small holes throughout. Baked at just 350 degrees! Gasp! I’d rather go back to no-knead, I thought – which we’d liked for it’s texture and crust, but flavor was always lacking. Then, searching around for other beginner sourdough recipes, I found your lovely blog. Joy!
Your post made a Tartine style bread sound eventually approachable. So much so that I just took the levain I’d made for Donna’s bread and tweaked it. Yeah, it was lower hydration, so I just added some water. 🙂 Not the same thing at all, but what the heck.. it was all suddenly possible. I also knew that my starter never looked the way everyone else’s looked all over the web. The only thing was it had gotten a lot foamier than when I started building it and smelled good. It never doubled as far as I could tell. I am usually a stickler for details. I suppose that since I didn’t have a whole lot of faith in my starter to begin with, so I just relaxed all the way – nothing to lose. Halved your recipe. Including levain – I’m realizing this only now. Even though I’d read your instruction to not halve that. You won’t tell my 8 year old that *I* can’t follow instructions either, will you? During bulk fermentation, did the prescribed three sets of stretch and folds. I thought perhaps should do a fourth set, since my starter was so-so and based on how it looked and felt, compared to yours, but decided to skip. Just went a little longer on bulk. Was reading a good book, so a 10 minute bench rest became 20+. Twice. Whatever. Looked up a Chad Robertson and Klaus Meyers video on shaping. Useful! Shaping went okay, but would have liked to get a tighter final shape. But I didn’t want to use too much flour nor be too aggressive with the bench knife.
Poke test at the end of 16 hours was encouraging (based on never having done it before, hee hee) so I went ahead and baked it in an inverted dutch oven. (It was a pain to load. Might just go for upright dutch oven next time.) Slashing was okay. Again with more strength in the dough, it would have slashed better, I think. Loaf colored beautifully in the prescribed time and cooked to the right inside temperature. It even rose! It was not a flat pancake! Using only half the levain! There were many large holes inside. Other holes were smallish. The crust was a bit too thick and chewy. But oh my gosh the flavor was so good. Everything I’d dreamed of. Just flour, tap water and salt and some loosely followed instructions!!
I will have to bake more of these now – after correcting all those issues, starting with the starter. Love the rubber-band trick and looking for streaks in noting starter progress. And the best part is, with 90% of your blog still to discover, I feel I might even nail it one day soon. You are *so* responsive to questions. I feel confident that whatever issue I might get stuck with will either already be answered here or that I have only to ask. Thank you so so much for your detailed, thoughtful and super-practical posts and responses. There is good bread in my family’s future thanks to your generosity in sharing your experiences.
Thanks so much for the comments and the detailed account of your bake with my recipe — and it sounds like it went really well! It’s totally find if your starter is a bit more “frothy” on top, I usually see this when I’m feeding with a bit more water than usual or the flour has changed and it’s displays different characteristics with the same amount of water. But anyways, sounds like you’re well on your way!
I’m definitely around to help. Feel free to drop a comment on any of my recipes or use the Contact link at the top to shoot me over an email and I’ll be happy to help.
Happy baking and thanks again for the kind words!
Is it okay if I use a Romertopf clay pot to bake the bread?
I’m not familiar with Romertopf but a clay pot will work really well! Just make sure it’s rated for the temperatures listed here and the lid seals up fairly well — that’s it!
Happy baking 🙂
Thanks.
Hi! I just looked up the Romertopf clay pot and yes, these will work very well for baking this recipe, and any recipe, here at my website!
Thank you.
I have never made sourdough bread before, but am very interested. This article should be able to help me get started since it is labeled for beginners. Hopefully I can get the first batch to turn out, and eventually reach restaurant quality. Thank you for posting this!
http://www.klostermanbakery.com
You’re very welcome, glad it has inspired you! The taste is definitely worth it — happy baking Sarah!
Hi Maurizio, thanks for your excellent directions! I am in the middle of my first batch at the moment, I am doing the stretch and fold part and everything is looking good. I have run into a snag though. I realized that 16 hours of proofing after I finish this part will take me to the middle of the day tomorrow when I really should be at work! If I have to either lengthen or shorten my refrigerator proof time, which is less damaging, a couple of hours less or more?
You’re welcome, thanks for the kind words! I prefer to go a little longer in the proof, especially with this recipe. The flour should be able to take the extra fermentation time with no problem. Try it out, you might surprised that it comes out just fine!
Let me know how it goes 🙂
Hi Maurizio, thanks for the advice.I wound up proofing it waaaay too long, like 24 hours rather than 16 as ended up working late, but I baked it anyway knowing it was over proofed, and it still came out perfectly edible and tasty! It makes really good toast, too! I used a red fife flour which I realized after was whole wheat, so that probably made it a little denser too. All in all even with the challenges, a success, and I will make it again with a better sense of the schedule. Also I didn’t have a vessel for baking it in so i just used a cookie sheet and put a pan of water in the oven with it. I will graduate to better equipment gradually.
Excellent! I actually find bread that’s overproofed to be really great tasting, especially toasted as you said! That’s an easy thing to fix next time and it sounds like you learned quite a bit from this bake, glad to hear that.
Have fun on the next one!
hello Maurizio. The leavened dough is baked straight from the fridge to the oven? it is not necessary to warm to room temperature. Thank you for your advice and forgive my english.
Hello! Yes, baked straight from the fridge. I don’t warmup my dough unless I feel like it needs extra time to ferment, which is rare for me. Happy baking!
Hey Maurizio! I love your blog — beautiful photos and such a great resource for a sourdough beginner like me.
I’ve been running into a recurring issue and I’m wondering if you might be able to help. I generally am producing somewhat flat, dense loaves. Here are photos from a couple of recent bakes: http://imgur.com/a/mFCH2
And then my bake today: https://imgur.com/a/4f4od — which, while the height is a bit better, it’s perhaps the densest crumb I’ve seen yet.
I have some suspicions that my shaping method could be improved…I feel like I have to add a ton of flour to prevent the dough from sticking to my hands, my bench scraper, and everything else, really! Any advice on that front would be awesome — and if you have any other suspicions I’d love to hear them. 🙂
Thank you! Glad it’s been helping 🙂 It’s hard to say exactly just from the photos but to me it looks like your dough could use more fermentation. Try to get in at a “final dough temperature” (as I’ve described above) around 78ºF and then try to keep your dough somewhere warm during the entire bulk phase. 78-82ºF would be ideal. You can use your turned-off oven as a nice and sealed bulk chamber, toggle the light inside on and off to keep the dough warm.
If your dough is warm enough then you either need to extend your bulk a little longer or your proof step in the fridge. Look for my cues as I’ve listed above for when to end bulk, it might be longer than 4 hours as there are a lot of variables in play there.
As far as the stickiness, you could try reducing hydration by 5-10% to see if that helps with it. Stronger fermentation will also help strengthen up the dough, so the steps above may end up helping.
I’d suggest trying one thing at a time and see if that helps.
Let me know how it goes, there is also the other possibility your dough is actually overproofing, but that would only be the case if you used a lot of levain (more than I list), temperatures are higher than what I list, or if you proofed for a very long time in the fridge.
Keep me posted and I hope that helps!
Awesome, thank you! I’ll let you know how it goes. 🙂
Hey Kiersten, I’ve been having the same problem–wet, sticky dough that seems not to “lift” much during bulk fermentation…certainly not 20-50%. Just curious, did you have any luck with A) longer bulk-fermentation or B) slightly higher temperature during bulk fermentation or both?
(I think I’m going to try out less hydration for the next loaf).
Cheers,
Sam
Sam, sorry to interject here, but I’d say definitely go with a lower hydration next time if the dough feels overly sticky and wet to you. Dial it back as far as needed — each flour and environment is different! Good luck & happy baking!
Hey Maurizio! Finally got a chance to tackle it again and had another frustrating bake, sadly.
The FDT was right on, but I ended up adding a lot of folds in (6 or 7 because the dough seemed so slack) and extended the bulk to about 6.5 hours since I had it with me in the car and couldn’t keep it as warm as I’d like. (haha, anything to fit sourdough into my schedule!)
The shaping seemed a lot easier than before, but when I baked it off after 17–18 hours in the fridge, it totally pancaked out like it has in the past. It’s still cooling but I’m not expecting a very good crumb on this guy: http://imgur.com/a/H6OIT
Did I totally screw it up with all those folds? Something else you suspect?
Hey, Kiersten! Adding in more folds is not a problem — if the dough needs it then it needs it. In fact, adding more strength like that should actually help prevent pancaking in the oven so something else must be amiss.
A crumbshot would help me diagnose a bit more but it could be possible you’re overproofing your dough, especially if you think hydration was more manageable with this last bake and it still pancaked. If the interior of the loaf had lots and lots of little holes and it was perhaps a bit more sour than usual i’d say overproofed is the culprit.
Keep everything as consistent as you can as the last bake and reduce that bulk time and/or proof time. At 78ºF – 80ºF bulk for me lasts about 4 hours so if you were around those temps as well then 6.5 hours is quite a long time. In addition your proof was about 6 hours longer than what I typically do… Not to say your dough doesn’t need this but I would try to cut back both of these next attempt and see if it helps. Keep me updated!
I’m guessing you’re right…the crumb was dense and kinda gummy. I’ll give it another shot! Thanks again for your help. 🙂
You’re very welcome — good luck with it!
What a great blog! Your starter recipe was a big help. I followed it to the letter and got great results. I’m going to do the beginner sourdough tomorrow and have one question about your recipe. Is it correct that the cold-proofed loaves go directly into the oven with no room temperature proofing? I’ve made many yeast breads before (though this is my first sourdough) and have never seen such a technique.
Thank you! Yes I’ll typically bake the loaves straight from the fridge. I take them out, score them and transfer them in. The cold dough is easier to slash and load, and I haven’t seen any less of a rise if the dough is brought up to room temperature.
Have a great bake!
Thanks, Maurizio. Given that this is my rookie effort, I’m sure I’ll benefit from the additional stability the chilling will provide.
And the results. . .
https://www.flickr.com/photos/143783435@N08/shares/7vVYKN
What’s your assessment, Maurizio? Any suggestions for improvement?
Lookin pretty good! Nice rise and nice color on the crust. I’d suggest proofing a little longer, either in bulk fermentation, in proof or a little in both. That might help open up the crumb a bit more. If you notice rise on the next one is sluggish then you might have gone too far. It’s always a balance there, finding that sweet spot can be challenging.
Great work, though!
Thanks for all of the great Information on this site. I’m hoping to bake a successful sourdough next weekend. Can you tell me what size bannetons you’re using for this recipe? I’m assuming that they’re 8″ (based on your equipment page), but from Amazon’s description the 8″ batton is suitable for 1lb of dough. Since this recipe is for 900 gram loaves, will I need larger bannetons? I’ll be baking the bread in the 3.2 L. combo cooker. Thanks again!!
You’re welcome! I just measured my bannetons and from rim to rip at the top, the inside diameter is 8″. At the top from the outside to outside it’s about 9″. I’d say these hold 900g just fine, the dough might rise a bit over the rim but I puff up my plastic bags so there’s no chance of them constricting the dough.
900g will fit in the Lodge combo cooker.
Hope that helps!
Hello, and thanks for all the great info. I have a fair amount of experience, making mainly yeasted doughs, an overnight poolish, etc., using that to sort out various techniques and learn the ropes over the past few months. I recently started moving up to natural leaven and decided to try this recipe. I am having similar problems with this as I’ve had with other high hydration recipes, where the dough is just SO sticky that it’s a real challenge to get it shaped, a decently tight skin, and into the basket! I mean, it just grabs onto anything that touches it. Hands, scraper, bench, the works. I try not to introduce too much flour at this point (I had some loaves end up with small veins of raw flour in some other attempts) but I really have to use enough to form some layer or there’s just no way to handle the dough. I watch some videos of this hydration or higher and I see the dough lifting right off the bench… Clearly not the same thing I’m dealing with! The humidity here at my house today in Los Angeles was 58%. Could that be it? I cover the dough during bulk, should I leave it uncovered? Is it just not rising long enough in bulk to hold shape better (It’s not runny on the table, and it cooks up well, rises well in the oven, good spring, etc.) Maybe the flour I’m using (KA AP or Bread flour with a little locally milled WW). I guess I should just lower the hydration a little to get it to something I can handle, but I’m wondering what may be going on – if I’m doing something wrong. It’s an unwieldy beast!
These are out of the oven now – made these smaller loaves, four instead of two, about 550gms each (better size for passing out to friends…). They turned out well, but obviously my scoring technique needs work! They kind of busted out all over… Inside the crumb is good but a bit uneven, probably due to the shaping issues I was having? So the real issue is shaping, and dealing with the sticky dough. But the nice thing about bread, you can screw up a lot, and it still tastes good! Here are the loaves: https://goo.gl/photos/efLoMioR4ptDjt12A
They look great! I’d say the interior looks really nice, the crust is well colored and it looks rather thin — very nice all around. That busting on the crust can be alleviated somewhat by proofing a little longer, sometimes dramatic rise like that can be caused by underproofing just a bit (it can also be due to insufficient scoring, the rise needs to happen somewhere). Overall though I’d say you’re doing just fine!
Shaping high hydration dough is sticky no matter what. However, building up enough strength in the dough and strong fermentation help reduce this and will help your dough want to stick together instead of stick to everything else. Strength, through mixing/kneading and stretch and folds, will reduce that shaggy, sticky dough that is common with high hydration loaves. Of course there is a balance there, though, you don’t want to strengthen it so much that it doesn’t relax enough before baking, allowing it to rise to full potential. That point of “strong enough” is found through experimentation and a lot of factors go into it. Over time you’ll develop an intuition for that point (you might already have this!).
The acids produced by fermentation strengthen the gluten in your dough, which has a similar effect as kneading/stretch and folds, to some degree. You want your starter strong and healthy. By the end of bulk you’ll notice your dough is shiny, holding its shape more and if you tug on it with a wet hand it’ll resist your tug a little more — more elastic instead of extensible.
I hope those comments help, you’re bread really looks great!
Thanks. There’s so much information of what affects what that it takes a while for it all to stick (the dough itself sticks just fine, as I mentioned…). Getting a sense for it only comes from experience and practice – I’m slowly getting my bearings. Also the process is so long that each ‘lesson’ only happens once or twice a week. I’m trying again today, and just going with the hydration as is, I’ll use a little flour and try to keep it to a minimum and hope my technique gets better. I tried a bit more folding this time during bulk to see if it helps with stickiness, etc. during shaping. We’ll see! Thanks again for the follow up.
Sure thing! Yes, you’re right, the problem is for us non-professional bakers we only get to give this a try a few times a week, at best. There’s a lot to practice and I know how you feel! Keep at it, each time things get better and better. Happy baking!
Dear Maurizio,
Thank you for all the information on the site, so help full and well written. Following the beginner sourdough recipe I have got some good results, the bread is coming out absolutely delicious, but I would like to get a more open crumb and better oven spring.
The loaves always seem to spread out a little bit and not rise like yours where they get the dramatic shape and pronounced ears. I’m wondering if I’m over proving the loaves (due to work constraints I prove at room temp until it passed the poke test). Or maybe I should try a different levain, my 50% rye 50 % bread flour starter doesn’t seem to like being fed whole wheat, could I just use my normal flour mix of rye and bread to build a levain. Or maybe I should scale the hydration down, I’m from the UK and I have been told our flour doesn’t absorb as much water as yours does in the US, although I have just got some new stone ground flour from a local mill i’m looking forward to using! I know that there is a lot to go on!
Thank you so much for your help so far, without this site I would have thrown in the sourdough towel long ago!
Adam I’m glad I could help! There is definitely a lot going on and getting a dramatic rise with a nice ear is the byproduct of all the small steps in this recipe adding up to the end result. I’d recommend trying to work on a single thing at a time so you know if what you’re trying is leading you down the right path or the wrong path.
I’ve also read that UK flour isn’t able to take on the same hydration as the flour found here in the US — that’s an easy fix, just reduce hydration till the dough looks similar to what I show here or until it’s comfortable for you. If the hydration is too high the dough will feel “soupy” and resist holding together, wanting to spread out quite a bit. You’ll also know if by the end of your bulk fermentation the dough in the container looks completely flat, there’s no rounded edge between the dough and the side of the container. It’ll look like a bowl of liquid and not strengthened dough, trapping gas.
It’s possible you’re overproofing, but that’s an easy fix just reduce your proof time a few hours and see if things improve. Signs to look for with an overproof are sluggish rise in the oven, lots and lots of small holes in your crumb, and your loaves fail to expand upward, pushing open the area you slashed with your lame. The area where you score should look like the dough is stretching apart.
Another possible cause here is you are not shaping with enough tension and so your dough is spreading too much. If you don’t get a tight enough skin on the dough it will want to spread instead of rising up through your score.
I hope this helps! Try to work on one of these at a time and check the result, adjust as you go. Let me know how it works out!
I’d add to your advice that once I started proofing in the fridge (as opposed to at room temp like Adam Smith above) I got MUCH better results in the oven. Scoring was a thousand percent easier and more successful – the dough has more resistance than at room temp so the blade slices right through instead of grabbing. And I believe putting the dough in the hot oven when it’s cold also adds to the spring. Worked great for me anyway after having similar issues.
Definitely. Scoring from a cold fridge helps immensely and the dough is always a bit “stronger” from the fridge, helping to keep it together when you load it into the oven — which is especially welcome when baking porridge or high hydration dough.
Thanks for the comments!
Hi Maurizio! Very appreciative of your awesome blog! I’ve been baking bread using the Tartine method for about 3 months with incrementally better results, but I feel even though the loaves come out well I really don’t know what to look for when it comes to proofing. I read about the finger dent method, which I use (again not sure how slow or fast it should bounce back, really. And big difference between room temp loaves and cold ones). So was just wondering if you could share your experience and any tips regarding proofing. Thank you!
Christian, really glad you’re enjoying my site! The “poke test” is used to help determine when the dough is proofed enough to bake, but not too much. If you gently poke the dough it should slowly spring back to its original form. If it springs back very fast then the dough has not had enough time to proof, give it another hour and check it again. If it doesn’t spring back at all then the dough has likely overproofed, bake it as soon as possible. If the dough slowly springs back to it’s original shape then it’s just right, bake it soon.
It’s hard to determine exactly when to bake your bread when doing a cold retard (proof in the refrigerator) because the poke test isn’t always reliable here. The dough gets cold and stiff in the fridge so it will always have a tendency to resist springing back. You should still do a few gentle pokes, though, as it helps you build up an intuitive understanding of how the dough feels at various proof times. If the dough feels weak then you’re getting close to over proofing, if it feels incredibly firm, almost like a solid lump, then it needs quite a bit more time.
When baking loaves that are proofed overnight in the fridge I like to start with 12 hours and adjust up/down from there. If you notice your bread has very sluggish rise in the oven and kind of spreads out then that is a sign of possible over proofing — reduce your proof time by 1-2 hours in the fridge next time. If your bread almost explodes in the oven with ruptures all over then this is a sure sign your dough has not proofed enough, give it 1-2 more hours in the fridge next time. If you get a nice rise with a clean opening where you slashed (scored) your bread and the interior has no gummy or dense areas that is likely the perfect proof point.
The most important thing with this is to focus on proofing and try to keep everything else the same from bake-to-bake. If you change your flour, temperatures or levain percentage then you’re almost working with a completely new slate. It’s best to change only a single thing each time you bake so you can determine if that thing helped or didnt help.
I hope that all makes sense, let me know if you’re still having issues — happy baking!
Hi Maurizio.
I will try your recipe and schedule method tonight but I had a question. What do you think about the French Technic of “slap & fold” the dough ? I saw the French Boulanger Richard Bertinet baking a sourdough bread using this technic and I did the same in the past on a french baguette and could noticed that doing this way the dough gets fast structured for the last bulk fermentation. The result in a sourdough bread gets any difference between the 2 ways ? I meant, slap & fold or just the “letter fold” .
Thanks in advance.
I really like the slap and fold method, in fact I use it quite often. You’ll see me refer to it here on some of my recipes, it’s a great way to introduce some strength into the dough early on (and some air, also). I will typically do a short session of this, 3-5 mins, and then a few folds during bulk depending on how the dough feels. I’m going to work on a video here for my site showing how I do it!
I will be waiting for the video.
thanks.
Hi Maurício.
Just a simple question. Building a leven (levain) is made with water, flour and starter and is usually done in the night before or early morning of the baking day, right ? But if for some reason I’ve forgotten all of it and have a starter already fed and on its peak, may I use it and have the same effect since the starter is just flour and water fermented ?
Thanks in advance.
PS.: Sorry Maurizio I started this post spelling your name in a portuguese way … lol
Fredy — that’s correct, your levain is made with water, flour and some small starter amount, created in the morning or night before. You can definitely see your starter as a levain, in essence, and if you forget to make a separate levain you could just use a portion of your starter to mix with your dough for a bake.
The reason we create a separate levain is because it may use a different mix of flours or hydration percentage to reach different results, or it may use a large seed percentage of mature starter so it ferments at a faster pace. At many bakeries they actually do not keep a separate starter and they feed their starter with enough flour and water so there’s enough to mix with their dough when they need it but also enough to keep the culture going.
I hope that makes sense! In essence both the starter and levain are just fermented flour/water, but the levain can be made with different ratios of each for different end results.
No worries, Maurizio has an Italian, Spanish and Portugese spelling 🙂
Maurizio, thanks for your answer. What you explained just met my thoughts. I tried a sourdough for the last 2 days and it was a disaster…lol I don’t know what I did wrong, specially after the last one that turned out beautifully as you could see on pictures but I will try again nest week-end. I’m right now in the kitchen making a Traditional French Baguette and also on week-end I’m planing tô do it “sourdough”.
I was yesterday reading about your trip tô Japan and I have tô say that I’m crazy tô visit. My initial interest in gastronomy was because of a Japanese restaurant that, unexpected, came tô my hands tô take care of it. Then I had tô learn about fish, rice, vinegar, miso, sushi, sashimi, sukiyaki and etc. I took classes and more classes with japanese chefs (Itamae). It was a journey of pleasure.
Thanks for all.
Greetings.
Ah sorry to hear about those 2 past loaves! Keep practicing, it will get much better trust me!
I would love to work in a Japanese restaurant for a short while, to gain some more experience with all the wonderful ingredients they use. It’s such a different set of ingredients that make for incredible flavors. Sounds like you had a fantastic time!
Hope your next bake is a great one — happy baking!
I have another question or could be an advise but I will make a new post because it could be inserting for others.
Maurizio- I just wanted to take a minute and thank you for all the work you put into your guides and website. I started on my own bread journey not too long ago and made my first sourdough loaf a couple days ago using this recipe. The fact that you take the time to respond to every single comment is admirable to say the least. My only problem with the loaf was that they didn’t rise in the oven, after reading the comments though, I think this was due to not enough strength after shaping. They didn’t hold their shape well, just kind of laid flat. Even still, what amazing flavor! I will be trying again soon, thanks again!
Jared — thanks, I’m really happy to help! I know it can be hard sometimes getting started with sourdough, a little help goes a long way.
Yes, you definitely need sufficient strength when you shape your boules or they’ll just spread in the morning when you go to bake. Try shaping a bit tighter next go and see if that helps. Let me know if you’re still having problems.
Happy baking!
Greetings Maurizio,
First of all, thanks a lot for you blog/site. It is very inspiring.
I’m a newbie on sourdough breads but I have already done some tests with good results with another kind of breads. I’m trying this recipe of the beginners with some changes in the amounts of the ingredients and in flours. I live in Brasil where is very difficult to find bread flours or white flours unbleached and with “good” amount of proteins (gluten). Usually it does not get higher than 5%. Trying to solve this problem I bought a Flour of Gluten that has 28% of proteins to do a mix. My 100% of flours – 450g – were divided in : 100g Flour of Gluten, 314g of All Purpose White Flour (bleached), 18g Whole Wheat Flour, 18g Rye Flour. And the rest were 315g of water, 9g of sea salt and 94g of my starter (levain) made from Whole Wheat and Rye. I’ve just finished my first fold and I’m planing to do the last fermentation inside of my refrigerator which I’ve being noticed helps to keep the dough tight and makes easy the scoring with the blade. Let’s see how it will turn out … lol
Unfortunately I will not be able to wait until tomorrow to bake it and I’m going to do it late this night.
You’re very welcome, thanks for the comments!
5% protein is very, very low! I have never worked with flour anywhere near that level of protein. I think your approach is a great idea, you definitely need to get that number up to around 10-11% (which is typically “all purpose” here in the US) by blending.
I’m very interested to hear your results, good luck!
Hi there Maurizio !
The bread came out of the oven beautiful … . The inner part very soft and cheewy for my surprise because I believe that it happens when a special amount of sugar is added to the dough. The crust was really cracking when pressed and also on bites. It was my first time using an iron cast pan. I’m posting 2 photos … 1 of the whole bread and a second one of it cut in half.
Links:
http://cl.ly/1v3F3f3w213h
http://cl.ly/1q3l323K081R
Thanks.
Fredy — that’s great to hear! You’re bread looks awesome, and I bet the taste was even better. Thanks so much for the update and happy baking!
Fredy, I’m Brazilian also, living in RS! I can find flour here that are around 10% protein but sometimes I mix it with some Italian 00 flour. My main issue with sourdough recipes is hydration! My dough is always a shaggy mess! It doesn’t hold up its form! Are you getting good results with high hydration loaves and our flour? I’m slowly decreasing the hydration every time I bake but I’m afraid I won’t get all those beautiful holes I see in non-brazilians loaves…
Simone — thanks for the comments! You can definitely get an open crumb and a light loaf without having to push the hydration really high. With proper fermentation you can achieve a nice light loaf with your flour! If the protein percentage isn’t as high as US flour you might not get huge caverns and large holes but it’s possible to get a well-fermented, airy loaf. Plus, taste is most important! 🙂
As I’ve mentioned before here and there hydration is related to your flour so decreasing it as you go is a great idea, you want to find that sweet spot for your flour.
Happy baking!
Hi Maurizio,
This is a wonderful site! I really appreciate all of the details you provide without it being too overwhelming – really nice for a new sourdough baker like myself! I’m trying this recipe now, and I’ll be using a baking stone with a pan of boiling water for steam, as I don’t have a dutch oven (yet!) You mention in the comments below that it will be fine, but I’m wondering if I need to adjust the oven temperature and baking time accordingly? Many thanks!
reshma
Reshma, thanks so much for the kind words, I really appreciate that!
I have notes listed above for the difference in oven temps between baking on stones versus a Dutch oven. I find when baking on stones you can push the oven temperature higher without scorching the bottom of your loaves. I like to preheat the stones for 1 hour or so at 500ºF, after this I’ll bake for the first 20 minutes at 500ºF with steam, then the remaining time at 450ºF without steam (remove the pan or don’t add any more water). Essentially I bump the temps just a bit.
Hope that helps!
Hi Maurizio,
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/45964/fresh-oven
This is my beginner’s sourdough bread. It’s a good result and next weekend I’ll bake this bread again!
Thanks!
WOW that looks fantastic! Really nice work 😀
Hello Maurizio,
I’m new to here and baking sourdough bread. I’ve just baked bread with my own sourdough starter since April. Yesterday I tried your beginner’s recipe which is very helpful especially the time table. I haven’t got the hang of high hydration dough and 78% is too high for me so I decreased the hydration to 70%. My difficulty is pre-shape! My hands and bench knife always dither over the wobbly dough! Are there any good tips for beginners to do pre-shape?
Now the dough is in the oven! Seems to have good oven spring!
I want to have fresh bread at lunch time so your time table very suits my weekend plan.
Thank you very much!
Ako
I plan to have some videos up for each of these steps soon, that will definitely make things more clear. For pre-shape I like to gently dump out the mass of dough into the counter and then use the bench knife as much as possible while only using my flour-dusted hand when needed. I cut and push the dough with the knife and then using my other hand and the knife gently guide the dough around and around to build tension. Use a little more flour on you hands if necessary!
Your bread sure turned out nice so I’d say you’re doing really well!
The video is what I need. Repeatedly watching the hands and bench knife handling the dough is for me very helpful. Please do make some videos!
Yesterday I found when handling the dough the bench knife needs more than hands and I haven’t got the bench knife skill yet.
I’ll be working on those videos very soon 🙂
Yes it takes quite a bit of practice and as you practice your confidence and ability will grow!
Keep practicing and happy baking!
The crumb of my beginner’s sourdough bread turned out to be the best one I’ve ever done! So I’ve just started doing Instagram:)
https://www.instagram.com/p/BGBS7hQINNn/?taken-by=helloiamako
Again, thank you very much for your precise instructions.
That’s great! I’m so glad I could help 😀
Hi Maurizio,
I’m looking forward to the videos as well. Thanks!
Coming soon!
Hello Maurizio,
I’m a first timer in sourdough. Glad I found your website. You explain it so well. I cant wait to bake this tomorrow morning. But , can I bake this with home-steam-oven method ? Is there any difference in crust between steam oven method and combo cooker method ? Thank you so much.
You can definitely bake this either way, in a combo cooker or using my home steaming method explained on my site. I find the combo cooker is easier when you’re just starting out and it gives really great results. It will color the bottom of your loaf a tad more but not a problem. I like my other method as I can do larger loaves and make different shapes such as longer batards. So yea, either way will work well!
At what point do you recommend adding flavors and aromatics like walnuts or herbs?
I’ve played around with this quite a bit and I usually either add it right before bulk fermentation, in my second phase of mixing, or right after the second set of stretch and folds. Honestly I think either way works really well, if you do it earlier you can mix things in a bit easier but later could potentially help prevent destroying the gluten network you’ve spent time and energy building through mixing.
I usually decide based on the ingredient I’m adding in: porridge (like oats or polenta) goes in early but more “harsh” ingredients like nuts go in later. As far as oils (like walnut oil or olive oil) I feel like adding these in at any time is fine.
Hope that helps!
Thank you!! It does help. By the way this beginner sourdough post has been so super helpful to me as I start to get into it. I’ve already played around with percentages keeping your base recipe and method and it works really great. Just did an 85% hydration 90% whole wheat (half of which was whole wheat bread flour) 10% buckwheat and it worked beautifully. My husbands fave so far. Next I want to go back to mostly white bread flour and incorporate some black garlic I just made, maybe with walnuts or dry cured black olives. Having so much fun with it!
So happy to hear that! I really love the flavor of buckwheat, adds a nice earthiness to the bread and that black garlic concoction sounds awesome! You’re right though, endless possibilities and so fun 🙂
Another question for you- when adding oils or something on the wetter side like nut butter, or honey – how do you adjust the percentages? Or do you? Would you lower hydration to allow for a wet flavoring ingredient or just go for it starting with, say, 50g per base recipe? I am wanting to do a sesame sourdough using tahini and sesame seeds. Thanks again 🙂
When adding in small amounts of oils and nuts I don’t adjust the hydration or flour percentages at all — many bakers take this approach. They are considered “add-ins” and not part of the base formula. I still list them here on my site in terms of baker’s percentages just so readers get a feel for how much is added.
Thank you for this and everything on your site- I so appreciate the time and detail, and that you are kind enough to respond to so many questions!
I have been reading and researching for my first sourdough starter for about a week now (and non-stop for the past 5 hours), and will be creating my first starter when my flour arrives on Monday!
If all goes well, that will put me on schedule for my first bake two weeks from now. I’ll be using organic sprouted white wheat flour and arrowhead mills organic rye, plus I have some whole wheat already on hand (can’t remember the brand). I was going to use the organic sprouted white wheat to replace the bread flour in your formula- wonder if you can anticipate any problems with that?
I just purchased a few vitals missing from my kitchen, but unfortunately made and fulfilled my list before finding your site. I bought a commercial-grade baking sheet in lieu of a stone (cheaper, needed for other things as my current ones are cheap and awful) and had read that I could use this with a pan of water in the oven for steaming… I know this won’t be the same, but will it still work with this recipe? Plan to buy the Lodge combo you recommended ASAP, but as a teacher heading into a no-pay summer, I have to watch my spending!
Thanks again for this wonderful blog!
You’re very welcome, Laura! Really glad you’re following along 🙂
I’m not intimately familiar with working with sprouted flour (coming soon!) so I don’t know all the characteristics of it — besides I’ve read it really increases fermentation rates and the health benefits. I’d say go ahead and use it, or perhaps some smaller percentage, and see how it turns out! I’m sure it’ll be delicious, just keep an eye on your dough as it might move along faster than the times I’ve listed in my recipes.
Your baking sheet will work just fine! Use what you have and you’ll get great bread, no worries about spending any more than needed.
Let me know if you have any more questions and let me know how things turn out, today is the day for you to get started!
Happy baking 🙂
I can’t wait to try this recipe. The only problem – I don’t have a Dutch oven, and I can’t afford one at the moment. I know you said use a stainless steel bowl, but that worries me. Could I just use the preheated baking stone and hope for the best? Will it not rise or get a nice crust without something on top?
Woops – one more question. Do you think I could somehow make the bulk fermentation (with the 3 stretch & folds) go a bit faster using the proofer in my bakery?
You can speed up bulk by increasing the ambient temperature at which your dough is resting. I usually target 80ºF but you could push it up to 82-84ºF and see how it does, it might complete around 3 hours at this temperature.
Alternatively you could also mix your dough with warmer water, say around 100ºF (don’t go too much higher than that, definitely not over 110ºF) to really shock things and get it moving.
You’ll have to experiment with these temps and times to suit your schedule but you get the gist! I hope that helps, let me know if you have any more questions.
Happy baking, Jenna!
Thank you!! Is using a metal mixing bowl really oven safe? I’ve been tempted to try but a bit nervous…
I’ve never personally used a stainless steel bowl but I know others have. Maybe if you pick one up at the store or on Amazon it’ll list the max temperature on it?
Absolutely! You’ll still get incredible sourdough — it may not rise as high as possible and it may have a little more of a dull crust but those things are no big deal at all. Your bread will turn out awesome.
Hello Maurizio,
Thank you so much for your blog, and for this detailed article «Beginner’s Sourdough Bread». It was so helpful! I read this article several times before attempting to do the recipe, yesterday, on Sunday. I am new to sourdough baking, and your recipe was my fourth attempt at making sourdough bread (the three other recipes I tried before were not very successful).
I have a very active rye sourdough starter, which rises easily (doubles volume in about 6 hours, and triples if I wait longer). I followed your recipe step by step, carefully measuring the ingredients in grams. I used Robin Hood white bread flour (a Canadian flour), and an organic integral stoneground wheat flour. During mixing, the dough looked very runny and wet sloppy, so I added about 1 tablespoon white bread flour (I didn’t measure exactly in grams for this 1 tablespoon addition.) My final dough temperature was 78/79ºF.
I performed 3 sets of stretch and folds, and let the dough bulk ferment for a total of 4h30. After bulk fermentation, dough had raised nicely, and there were some bubbles on top.
When I preshaped, and then shaped the dough, it was sloppy and spread a lot, and didn’t hold shape. I tried to shape the dough the best I could, and placed it in a towel-lined pyrex bowl.
For the final proofing, I recided to let the dough rise at room temperature, because I wanted to bake the bread during the evening. After about 3 hours, the volume of the dough had nearly doubled, and the poke test looked good.
When I flipped the dough on the parchment paper (on the pizza peel), immediately the loaf spread quite a lot. I quickly scored it and placed it in my Dutch Oven, and baked following the instructions on your website.
The final bread is not bad. The middle of the crumb is a little more dense and sligthly humid (the inner temperature was 210ºF, but I wonder if I should have left the loaf to bake a few minutes longer…). But overall, the taste is great, the crust is thin and crisp, and the crumb is tender, not heavy, and filled with little holes. Definitely my best sourdough bread so far.
Here is a picture of my bread:
https://goo.gl/X2S7Uo
However, I was disappointed to see that my loaf did not rise at all during baking, it had no oven spring at all… The final, baked loaf is exactly the same height as the uncooked dough that I placed in the Dutch oven. The final loaf of bread is quite flat… Any clues why my loaf didn’t rise in the oven?
I also wonder why my dough didn’t hold its shape. Maybe next time I should reduce the water in the recipe? What do you think?
Thank you!
Thanks for sending over that picture and detailed description, that helps a lot! To me it looks like your dough was over-hydrated, as you guessed. It looks like you have strong fermentation and I’d guess with less water in the mix your bread will turn out really nice.
Next time try reducing the water used by 10-15% and see how it turns out. The dough should definitely spread less and when you bake the interior won’t be so moist. I’m pretty confident this change will fix your issue!
Let me know how it goes — happy baking, Deb!
Thank you so much for your answer! I will try again this Sunday with 10-15% less water. I’ll let you know how it goes. Thanks again!
Hi Maurzio, thank you so much for your posts. They’ve been incredibly helpful in helping me wrap my head around baking my first sourdough loaf. I’m planning to bake this recipe for the first time and I had a couple questions.
What is the reason for leaving the cover to the combo cooker in the oven?
For baking the second loaf, do I stagger taking out the second loaf from the fridge?
You’re welcome, Kelsey! You don’t have to leave the cover of the combo cooker in the oven, but I do because I find it adds a little more mass to retain heat when I open and close the door. This way even when I open the door to the oven it quickly gets back up to temperature since there is a massively hot cast iron lid in there. Optional.
Yes, leave the second loaf in the fridge and take it out when your oven is back up to the preheated temp, then proceed just as the first.
Great questions! Happy baking 🙂
Hi Maurizio – just a quick question (sorry if you’ve already answered below, but I’m just about to start my new levain after feeding starter for the last 48 hrs). During the mixing of the flour stage to autolysing, how do you get your flour + levain + salt and the extra 50g water to mix in thoroughly? And is there such thing as overmixing? Do you add salt to the already mixed flour, then water then levain? I find it bit tricky to get my dough well combined during that stage, and some bits are softer than others? Thank you! Lyn
I do this initial mixing with my hand and sort of “pincer” the ingredients together along a line, and then fold one side over and repeat. This is a good way to get everything incorporated. Have a look up in my timeline under the “3. Mix – 1:00 p.m.” section, you can see the 4 pictures displaying my mixing technique.
There is such a thing as overmixing, but it’s very, very hard to do when mixing by hand. I wouldn’t be too worried about it.
It depends on the bread but for this recipe I add the salt, levain and reserved water together before mixing. Once you add all these things you really have to work the dough with your hand to get it all incorporated thoroughly. If you find the salt hard to incorporate you can dissolve it into the reserved water before pouring on top of your levain and dough.
I hope that helps, let me know if you have any more questions!
Thanks Maurizio! I will try that. I find that my levain needs longer than the 5-6 hrs. Not sure if it is the flour I’m using but still playing around with timing to get it to the right bubbly-ness. And that’s with a strong starter fed well over a couple of days…
And that’s totally fine! Adjusting to your individual starter (and conditions) is a good sign you’re doing the right thing — there’s no set timetable just read the signs (and smells) and adjust your feeding to suit. Good luck!
Thanks so much for the comments, I really appreciate that!
I was originally going to respond saying it’s possible your dough overproofed, if it goes too far (and this is easy to do with that much whole wheat and T70 — I find the T70 to really speed up fermentation!) you’ll get that spreading on the counter when you go to load them into your oven. From the description of your “poke” test though, it sounds like the dough was not overproofed. Keep an eye on this though and if my suggestion below doesnt help try to cut back on your proof time as well.
I would suggest you try to add a little more strength to your dough during mixing and/or bulk fermentation. Try adding 2 more sets of stretch/fold during bulk (really vigorous stretching and folding at the beginning), this should help prevent the dough from spreading so much after your preshape. I think what Chad Robertson describes in his book Tartine is important: at the end of preshape you want the dough to have really defined edges on your counter, it shouldn’t spread out so it looks like a flat pancake — if so then you need to either reduce hydration or add more strength to your dough.
I hope that helps, let me know if these suggestions work out!
Fantastic! Glad to hear it. T70 is one of my favorite flours to work with, such good taste and great performance. Have fun 🙂
Hello Maurizio! So this is my second time trying this recipe, albeit the small modifications. Taste is phenomenal. Crust is phenomenal. Both times, however, I have ended up with a very dense crumb with a few large bubbles. The modifications are the following: 1). all rye starter 2). Instead of Bob’s Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour, I used Bob’s Red Mill organic all purpose 3). I let the levain go for 8-9 hours (it expanded to its peak mixed after the autolyze close to 78 degrees F). Everything else was the same. 4 hour bulk ferment with 3 stretch folds at 30min intervals (got good signs of rising and bubbles here) at 80 degrees F. 16 hour proof in the fridge. Thoughts on why I am getting all that density? My starter is quite active on two a day feedings. The first time I thought this was the problem because the first bake was after 6 days. Second bake was after 12 days. Thoughts? Thanks so much.
Really glad to hear that, Anthony! It could be that your all purpose flour needs more strengthening, it has a lower protein percentage than “bread” flour. Try giving your dough 2 more sets of stretch and folds during bulk fermentation (so a total of 5 sets). Everything else sounds good to me, just make sure your levain is used around when it peaks (sounds like you’re doing that). As long as your starter is rising and falling predictably it should be strong enough to bake with, and it sounds like it is by your description of bulk fermentation with bubbles and rise.
Try a few more sets of stretch and fold with that all purpose flour and see if that helps open it up some more!
Thank you so much! Got a much better loaf this go around. Used a bread flour this time, did more stretch folds, a bit longer bulk, and I mixed the dough using the slap folds you had in one of your other posts. Appreciate your work and advice! Now that I am figuring out my process and I have had success, I am also looking to refine my ingredients from supermarket products to a good white bread flour and whole wheat bread flour. I called and talked to the folks at central milling. They recommended their organic artisan bakers plus (malted) and their T85 malted whole wheat flour. Have you used these? How was the performance? I am wanting to make a daily eater for my family and friends probably somewhere around 8-5% whole wheat. The last batch I did was more like 20% whole wheat. Thoughts? I appreciate your devotion to answering all these comments. Cao! (my family is originally from Alife which is about an hour and half north of Naples)
That’s fantastic news! Glad that last bake went so well.
I highly recommend Central Milling’s Artisan Bakers Craft (Plus) flour, it’s really good stuff. T85 is also one of my current favorites, it has an incredible taste (it contains more of the bran/germ than more white flour) and great performance. You cannot go wrong with those two flour choices. If you want to shoot for 5-10% whole grain in your dough with those two flours use mostly ABC with about 20% T85 (T85 is kind of like half white flour half whole wheat).
I haven’t yet been to Naples but it’s high on my list of places to go! Most of my family is in the south (near Brindisi) and some up north in Bologna. I love Italy! Ciao for now 🙂
Hi Maurizio, first of all thanks for writing these detailed instructions!
I tried to bake this bread yesterday, but the dough was really way to sloppy to handle. I did all required folds, but I didn’t manage to get the dough any firmer. When I left it to rest, it just spread out instead of staying in a nice shape. I ended up pouring it in a tin bread from, but it didn’t bake really well, no oven spring at all. I do live in Europe (Belgium), and read that there flour here can typically hold less water than American flours. Do you have any experience with this?
Hi, Steven! It sounds like a case of over-hydrating your flour. I’m surprised by this but again, every location has different flour and a different environment. I would recommend you try to reduce hydration significantly, perhaps by about 10% (try 627g water for the Dough Formula mix). This has happened to me plenty of times, usually a case of too much water for the flour to handle, as you guessed! Let me know how it goes, happy baking Steven!
Maurizio, thanks for the response! I tried making another loaf yesterday, this time decreasing the amount of water to 310 grams (I halved all of the ingredients). This morning, when I tried to shape it, it was still as liquid as the previous one. Actually, I didn’t even try to bake it, and just threw away the dough. One thing I forgot to mention in my previous post, is that I’m using spelt flour. I’ve searched around a bit, and found one site that recommended to decrease the water by as much as 10%-15%. So I’ll try reducing the water even further, to around 600 grams this time. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Ah sorry to hear about that Steven! I recently posted a spelt recipe here at my site and I warn readers about the same thing! Spelt does not hold onto water as well as traditional wheat does, be careful with that. Let me know how it goes next time with reduce hydration (even further). Happy baking 🙂
Well, I’m giving it another try, I’ve reduced the H2O to 255 grams (56% Hydration). It’s currently proofing in the fridge, and it’s the first time I’ve even bothered to put it in a banneton. But it still didn’t hold its shape well while resting after shaping it. It started as nice round dome shape, but ended a lot flatter even after letting it rest for 30 minutes. Still better than the previous one, which was more like a batter than a dough. Still, I’m not sure if how it will hold up when I remove if from the banneton tomorrow morning. Today, my Emile Henry bread cloche arrived, I can’t wait to give that a try first thing tomorrow morning! Let’s hope the dough doesn’t stick to the banneton.
I saw your spelt receipt yesterday, so I was eager to read it. But when I saw the hydration you use (85%!), there’s no way that would work with the flour I have. I think even the 56% I’m using now is a bit too much.
I couldn’t wait until tomorrow, so I baked it already, and it came out quite nice! http://twitter.com/sdehandt/status/725796606902153216/photo/1. A bit too much flour, but it’s the first time I’m using the banneton, so I wanted to be sure the dough wouldn’t stick. And now the hard part: letting it cool before tasting it… 🙂
Hah! Excellent, your bread looks great! I’m sure it tasted amazing 🙂 Yeah the hydration I’m using for my spelt loaf is so high mostly because the spelt flour is milled hours before using it, and it’s able to take on a little bit more water. It sounds like you might have found the sweet spot anyways!
Hi Maurizio, many thanks for this, it’s a great guide. I just made this bread and it’s delicious, but I have a problem when I bake that I never get a good oven rise. My starter is very active but my levain never passes the float test. I live in Asia. Do you think it’s possible that the local wild yeasts just aren’t strong enough to do the job?
You’re very welcome, thanks for the comments! I do not think it has anything to do with your locale. It’s fine if your levain doesn’t pass the float test, this isn’t a 100% reliable method, but it usually helps out. If you followed my guide exactly then the float test should pass, especially if you use the same types of flours I used here (if you make your levain with a significant portion of rye flour, for example, it would never pass the float test).
It could be that your levain is not quite yet mature enough to use and thus the sinking. Does it show significant bubbling around the sides and top? That aeration is what helps it float in water, you want it to have risen quite a bit and start to smell like ripe fruit — a little sour but not too much.
Check out my guide on starter maintenance, if you haven’t yet, which shows you what it should look like when it’s at its “peak”, which is exactly how you want your levain to look and smell.
Many thanks for the reply. My starter is a year old. I brought it over from Ireland. The very first loaf I made with it six months ago rose beautifully, but none have risen much since. I’ve switched to bottled mineral water and it made no difference. I followed your timings exactly and the levain failed the float test, so I gave it another hour, still with no results. I don’t use rye flour, the starter is fed with organic wholemeal and for the levain and bread I use a mixture of organic wholemeal and organic white bread flour. I’m stumped as to what the problem is.
Does your starter rise and fall predictably? You need this to happen for it to be strong enough to bake with. Make sure you’re feeding it on a schedule with the same flour and tap water (good enough to drink is good enough to use, don’t use mineral water) and try to keep at a temperature around 75ºF minimum. Once your starter is rising to a peak at around the same time each day (that’s when you should feed it) it’s strong enough to use!
Maurizio, you are officially the patron saint of sourdough.
Your last comment above made me think, maybe I’m keeping my starter in the fridge too much? I took it out & fed it at room temperature on a regular schedule for a few days, and it made a big difference. I also reduced the hydration to try to stop the loaf from spreading.
Your instructions on pre-shaping and shaping in this recipe are superb, I never really understood what to do until I read your descriptions, and they work. At the last minute I chickened out, and even though I had a nice boule I put it in a tin for the final retarded fermentation. Next time I’ll be braver, because I got a great loaf with lots of oven spring. I am delighted!
Thank you so much for this recipe and your very helpful comments. I’ve learned so much from your responses to others, too.
PS Still failed the float test, but didn’t seem to matter!
You’re very welcome, glad my comments have helped! Yes, you’ll definitely notice quite a bit more activity with your starter on the counter instead of in the fridge. The cold temperatures of your refrigerator will slow fermentation down significantly. In the future I hope to put up videos of shaping and other parts of the process, that should help significantly.
Happy baking!
My levain does not look nearly as active as this but I thought my starter was fairly strong. We shall see how it turns out.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEjiMk8FicM/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEjkOhgliRX/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEjka7vliR5/
Definitely did not get as much rise as yours did but I’m not unhappy with it by any means.
Camron, your bread looks great! For your first attempt that’s really nice. I’d say your dough could use a bit more fermentation, make sure during your bulk fermentation step your dough sits around 78-80ºF if that’s possible, if not extend bulk another 1/2 hour or 1 hour. That will help increase fermentation activity and time, respectively.
Great work!
I think the 2nd loaf turned out better. While the rise was kind of lacking, at least the oven spring was decent to balance out. The only real difference was slicing the box pattern instead of the single slit in the middle and the additional couple of hours in the fridge waiting to be baked.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEoD_EqFiYN/
I was able to keep it between 77 and 80 degrees during bulk using a space heater in my office but I think maybe my starter just needs to mature a little more also. I’ll keep up with three feedings per day for a week and see how it goes.
I’ll also give additional time a shot next time. The flavor is too good for there not to be a next time!
Looking great! Yes, I think that extra fridge time really helped, that added fermentation time is evident. You could try letting your dough sit out 30m-1h more on the counter after shaping but before placing into the fridge. This will give fermentation a little more time as well. Happy baking!
Thanks in advance for this painstakingly detailed tutorial on sourdough basics! I have studied it in detail and jumped in to the whole process with gusto. I am now at the end of Step 7 – my dough has been resting in the bowl for hours. (It didn’t rise nearly as much as yours did but I do see some bubble activity on the top.) However, I am stuck at step 8 because I don’t have a combo cooker or dutch oven, and I doubt my stainless steel mixing bowl would withstand 500F in the oven. Is there a simple, easy, and inexpensive hack for the oven set-up? Can I tent the dough with aluminum foil, and if so, is there a recommended technique for doing it? If not, what should I do with the dough – send it the way of the discarded sourdough starter (compost)?! Thank you very much for any suggestions you can offer!
I tried this recipe without a dutch oven and it turned out pretty good, though the crust wasn’t perfect.
Just bake on parchment paper in a flat cast iron pan or an oven tray. It’ll still taste pretty great, and you can work on the crust the next time.
You’re very welcome! As Henrik mentioned you can certainly just bake your dough without a Dutch oven or steam, it just wont rise quite as high. It’ll still be delicious!