Flavour & Fire
The Sourdough Journal
The Full Baking Process
From mixing to baking. One continuous line, spread over more than a day.
Making a sourdough loaf is not a collection of separate tasks. It is one long process in which the dough is constantly changing. From an active starter to a cohesive dough, from a soft mass to a loaf that can hold its shape, and finally to a warm, fragrant loaf with a crisp crust and an airy crumb.
The exact timings and techniques can vary, but the overall sequence remains much the same. Think of this as the route through the entire baking process: the individual stages will each have their own deeper guides later on.
Preparation: The Starter
The process actually begins before there is any dough.
The evening, or morning, before you plan to bake, you feed your starter so that it is active when you need it. You are not simply looking for a starter with a few bubbles on the surface, but for a culture that is clearly alive: airy, risen, active and familiar in its rhythm.
When your starter is ready, you use the amount your recipe calls for — either directly from your mother starter or as a separate levain built specifically for this loaf. From this point onwards, the focus shifts from the jar to the dough you are about to make.
Autolyse
Flour and water come together first, without starter and without salt.
The mixture does not need to look like a finished dough yet. The main purpose is to give the flour time to hydrate and begin developing. During this resting period, the flour absorbs the water and the gluten network begins to form.
Twenty to sixty minutes is a common window, depending on the recipe and method. It is a quiet stage, but one that can make a noticeable difference to the way the dough behaves later.
There is nothing to force here. Waiting is part of the work.
Mixing
After the autolyse, the starter and salt are added.
Now the dough is brought together as a whole. You work the ingredients through until the starter and salt are evenly distributed and there are no dry patches of flour remaining. At this stage, the dough will often feel quite loose and sticky. It has little tension and may not yet resemble the dough you will eventually shape.
That is normal. The structure does not need to be there yet.
From here, fermentation becomes an active part of the process.
Bulk Fermentation & Folding
During bulk fermentation, the character of the dough slowly begins to change.
The fermentation culture produces gas and acids, the dough becomes lighter, and the gluten network continues to develop. At the same time, folding helps build additional strength and structure.
Depending on the dough and the method, you might use stretch and folds or coil folds. You do not need to work the dough constantly. A folding session is followed by a period of rest, allowing the dough to relax and develop before you work with it again.
With each round, you can often feel the difference. At first the dough may be slack and sticky. Gradually it becomes smoother, stronger and more elastic. It begins to hold itself together.
Bulk fermentation does not end simply because a certain number of hours have passed. The dough gives you clues that it has developed sufficiently: through its volume, aeration, strength and the way it moves when you gently shake the bowl.
This is one of the most important moments to learn to look at the dough rather than simply watching the clock.
Shaping
By the time bulk fermentation is finished, the dough is no longer the loose mixture you started with.
It has grown, contains gas and has developed enough structure to be shaped. Now you give it its final form.
During shaping, you create tension across the surface. This helps the dough hold its shape and gives the loaf the structure it needs to rise in the oven rather than simply spreading outwards.
The aim is not to squeeze as much air as possible out of the dough. You want to handle the gas structure that has developed during fermentation with care, while creating enough surface tension to support the final loaf.
Once shaped, the dough goes into the banneton for its final stage of fermentation.
Cold Proof
The fridge slows the process, but it does not stop it.
In the banneton, the shaped dough gets a long, quiet period of rest. Fermentation continues at a lower temperature while the dough becomes firmer. This also makes it easier to turn the dough out of the banneton and score it later.
An overnight rest in the fridge is a common approach, but again, there is no universal number of hours that works for every dough. The temperature of your fridge, how far fermentation has progressed before chilling, and the dough itself all play a part.
Meanwhile, something happens that may be one of the nicest parts of sourdough baking: for a while, you do not have to do anything at all.
Except wait.
Baking
Then comes the moment when everything that happened before begins to show.
The oven and Dutch oven or baking vessel are thoroughly preheated. The cold dough is carefully turned out of the banneton and placed onto the baking surface. You score it, creating a controlled place for the loaf to open as it expands.
The dough enters the hot oven and immediately encounters a dramatic change in temperature.
During the first stage of baking, the loaf remains covered. The steam created inside helps keep the surface of the dough supple, allowing the loaf to expand further before the crust sets. This is when much of the loaf’s final shape and height develops.
After around thirty minutes, the lid comes off. From this point, the character of the bake changes. The crust begins to deepen in colour, becomes firmer and develops its final texture and flavour.
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Cooling
Taking the loaf out of the oven does not mean the process is over.
As the bread cools, the crumb continues to stabilise. Heat slowly leaves the loaf and moisture redistributes through its structure. The crust becomes firmer and the interior develops the texture you are looking for.
That is why cooling is not a detail to skip.
Cut into the loaf too soon and the crumb may feel damp, sticky or slightly compressed. Not necessarily because something went wrong during baking, but simply because the bread is still settling into itself.
The final part of the baking process may be the one that asks the most patience.
The Whole Process
When you see the entire process as one continuous line, it becomes clear why sourdough is more than a recipe.
You begin with a living starter. It becomes active enough to support a dough. Flour and water are given time to develop. Starter and salt are added. During bulk fermentation, the dough develops through fermentation while folding builds strength. Then the dough is shaped, given a long cold proof and finally placed in the oven.
No stage exists entirely on its own.
What you do during the first few hours influences what you see later. A starter that is not yet sufficiently active, a bulk fermentation that goes too short or too long, too little or too much tension during shaping — all of these choices can carry through to the finished loaf.
At the same time, this is not a process in which every minute is fixed. Temperature, flour, starter, dough and environment are constantly changing. That is why learning sourdough is not only about following recipes. It is about learning to read the dough.
For the details behind each stage, continue to the other articles in this hub. There, we go deeper into fermentation, folding, shaping, cold proofing, scoring, baking and everything that comes with them.
For now, this is the route.
Starter → autolyse → mixing → bulk fermentation → folding → shaping → cold proof → baking → cooling.
One process, spread over more than a day. And in the end, there is only one thing left: bread.
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The Complete Baking Process
From a spoonful of starter to a loaf on the counter — the same steps, every time, and never quite the same result.