I’ve made this recipe as achievable as possible, but it’s not dumbed down at all - this makes a fantastic loaf, and it’s my go-to recipe at home.
If you're fairly new to making your own bread, I would only ask that you give yourself a little time to practice. Don’t expect perfection first time around. Years of experience cannot be conveyed in a recipe because most of the skill of working with bread is about touch, and judging when is exactly the right time to put it in the oven.
The great thing about baking is that if you take the pressure off yourself to get it right every time; the process of practicing and improving becomes relaxing and enjoyable. And even your worst efforts will probably be very good to eat. They might just not look that great!
So please don’t feel bad if you’ve tried and failed with “foolproof” recipes you may have found. There’s no such thing. Sourdough (and bread in general) takes skill and practice. I hope my recipe, tips and video help you along the way.
Ingredients
390g white bread flour (or t65)
90g wholemeal rye flour (or white rye, wholemeal bread flour, or just add 90g more white bread flour)
330g water (this is the same as 330ml)
230g wholemeal starter (recipe and method here)
12g salt
Method
If you have a bread mixer, you can weigh this all directly into the bowl, and mix for 10 minutes at medium speed.
This hand mixing method takes a little longer but only requires a few minutes of your attention. Weigh all of the ingredients into a mixing bowl big enough to allow plenty of kneading space and proceed as follows…
Mixing by hand
1) Pull the ingredients together - in a mixing bowl - into a rough shaggy dough and cover with a tea towel.
2) After 15 minutes, return to the dough and gently pinch and stretch one edge, pulling it upwards and back over itself. Rotate the bowl and continue to stretch and fold. As the dough starts to tighten up and become strong, this method will start to resemble kneading. Do this for 1 minute.
3) Rest for 15 minutes and repeat the process for 1 minute.
4) Rest for 15 more minutes and this time wet your hand slightly before repeating the 1 minute of stretching and folding. Be careful this time not to tear the dough or get too much stuck to your hands. A slightly damp hand is really helpful for this.
5) Bring your dough into a ball (still in the bowl and still using a wet hand), and put in a lightly oiled container. Cover and allow to rise until just about doubled in volume. Depending on your starter this can happen quite quickly, or it can take all day. But usually it will be between 3-5 hours.
Myth - You will encounter many recipes that will give you exact rising times - ignore them. Different starters made in different places have different qualities - whatever recipe they were made to. You simply cannot accurately know how quickly someone else’s sourdough is going to rise.
Pre-shape
Once the dough is roughly doubled in size, carefully tip it out of the container onto a lightly floured surface. Use a dough scraper to help you if needed. Be gentle and try not to allow the dough to tear.
Ideally, what was the top of the dough in the container will now be face down on the board - this just helps with shaping and stops it sticking to the board, but it’s not a big deal.
Now gently pinch and stretch the far corner of the dough up and out, and pull it back over the rest of the dough. Rotate the dough slightly and repeat several time until you’ve created a loose ball (or boule). Gently flip over so that the folds are underneath. Flour lightly and cover with a tea towel to rest for half an hour.
Note - the dough will inevitably lose some volume during shaping, and that’s fine. The idea here is to handle gently, and not “knock back” the dough as some recipes require. We want an open and irregular crumb structure and handling gently is a big part of that.
Final shaping
Now place your hands on the far side of the dough with your little fingers flat on the board and your middle fingers touching at the tip. Gently drag the dough towards you. Ideally the side nearest to you should just grip the board (or work surface) and you should be forming a tighter ball.
Rotate the dough and repeat until you have a smooth slightly shiny skin.
Note - The idea here is to create a thin, taught skin around the dough. It takes a little practice to achieve this without tearing the skin, or pushing the gasses out of the dough. But you won’t ruin it either way, so don’t worry!
Now invert the dough into a well floured banneton and crimp the edges to help the dough hold its shape (see note 3). Cover with a double layer of lightly oiled cling film.
If you don’t have a banneton, you can line a mixing bowl with a well-floured tea towel.
Note 1 - If you find the the dough is sliding around the board as you try and shape it, it’s just a case of having too much flour around. Wipe it away and rest the dough for a minute, so that it can absorb what’s left on its surface. Try again.
Note 2 - Conversely to note 1, if you end up with a sticky mess on your hands, add a little more flour.
Note 3 - An experienced baker will be able to seal the edges of the dough together as part of this shaping process. But in place of that, you can wait until you’ve put it in the banneton and then pull the edges towards the middle of the dough and crimp them shut. (see video for clarity).
The final rise
Judging the perfect moment to put the loaf in the oven is one of the key skills of baking. And there’s no substitute for practice.
When I make this loaf I put it in the fridge overnight directly after shaping. This is what I did for this video. I find the timing also works. Making a sourdough is a long process and I’d rather be pulling a loaf out of the oven at 10 in the morning than at midnight. But it’s up to you.
If you do fridge it overnight, just pull it out of the fridge when you turn the oven on to preheat. It can be cooked directly from the fridge, but I think it’s better if it warms up just a little first.
If you don’t want to wait, or you don’t have space in your fridge, you can cook it on the same day…just let it rise for about 2 hours and bake. Remember that we have preserved much of the gas in the dough from the first rise, so it it won’t double in size. It will probably get about 35% bigger and will be soft and pillowy to touch.
The finger press test - when the dough is over proved, a finger pressed into it will leave a dent that doesn’t spring back at all. When it’s under proved it will spring back quickly and fully. We’re looking for the middle ground. The dent should start to spring back slowly and then stop, not quite fully disappearing. That’s the moment to get it in the oven.
Why is timing important? - A great many people either dramatically under or over-prove their loaves. Underproved means dense and heavy (which can be fine - you get a moist chewy crumb and good oven spring), over proved means the loaf loses shape in the oven and spreads outwards rather than springing upwards. Your slashes also won’t open very much, which kind of ruins the look. BUT - I honestly quite like the taste and texture of over-proved sourdough. So it’s just something to work on, not a be all and end all.
The bake
I preheat my oven as hot as it will go (260c) with the dutch oven in there from the start. Don’t worry if your oven won’t go that hot. Just set it to max and give it a good while to heat up. Around 30 mins. I know a lot of recipes call for an hour or more preheating but that seems very wasteful of energy to me. Your call.
When ready, carefully invert the banneton so that the dough slides gently into the dutch oven. Slash about 5mm deep using a lame, a razor blade or just the sharpest knife you have. I use a simple cross in the video but you can let your imagination run wild.
Note - The loaf only has so much oven-spring to give. So bear in mind that the more slashes you put into it, the less each one will open.
Immediately put the lid on the dutch oven and put in the oven (the oven oven). Drop the temp to 240C and bake for 25 minutes.
Remove the lid - and fingers crossed it’s risen explosively - return to the oven without the lid and drop the temp to 220C for 15 minutes.
Check after 10 mins and rotate if needed.
Most likely the loaf is now beautifully brown, with a crunchy crust. But if you like it even darker, you can remove the base of the dutch oven and drop the temp to 200C and keep cooking until you’re happy.
Note - You can undercook bread and end up with the doughy texture (there’s practically no chance of that using this method). But you can’t really overcook bread. You can burn it for sure. But failing that, the internal temperature can get up to a shade below 100C and it won’t go any higher (and that’s not a bad temp for a sourdough). So cook the loaf until you’re happy with the crust, and don’t waste a second worrying about overcooking it.
Cooling
I really can’t stress this enough: let the bread cool down before you cut it. I know that warm bread is a romantic ideal in the world of baking. But if you cut into your beautiful loaf before it’s cooled down the interior will feel doughy and the edges of the loaf will slightly collapse.
Also those caramelised flavours on the crust will begin to infuse through the entire loaf if you give it a little time, and the sensation of slight sourness will be more evident.
I never cut mine within the first 2 hours. It isn’t easy though.
Other methods…
Pizza stone
If you don’t have a dutch oven (or anything you can improvise with), the next best method would be to use a pizza stone and a peel.
For this method, preheat the oven with the pizza stone in place, and a heavy frying pan/grill pan/baking tray below.
Once the oven is fully heated, boil the kettle and line a pizza peel with parchment paper. Tip the dough onto the parchment-lined peel and slash.
If you’re feeling confident, you can line the peel up above the stone and whip it away in one swift movement, leaving the dough behind.
If that sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, hold the peel very close above the stone and in small jerky movements, shunt the dough and parchment from the peel to the stone. Take your time. The pizza stone will retain plenty of heat even if the oven cools a little. It’s better to go slow for the first few times than to drop your dough down the side of the oven.
Now pour about a mug’s worth of boiling water into the pan below and shut the door. Proceed as above, but check on the loaf after 15 minutes to check that it’s not burning or cooking unevenly. Reduce the temp or rotate it as needed.
Baking tray
The simplest of all methods - and the results are still good.
Set up the oven as for the pizza stone, but using your heaviest duty baking tray instead of the stone. When everything is ready (oven hot, water boiled, dough risen), remove the tray from the oven and invert the banneton so that the dough flumps gently onto the the tray.
Slash the dough, put in the oven and add the water to the pan as above.
Good luck!