Flavour & Fire
The Sourdough Journal
Your First Sourdough Loaf
Follow the steps once. After that, you will start to feel them instead.
Your first sourdough loaf does not need to be perfect. It does not need a dramatic ear, a perfectly open crumb or a shape worthy of a bakery window. It simply needs to be baked.
This is your first complete journey through the process, from the moment you feed your starter to the moment you finally cut into the loaf. There is enough here to guide you through that first bake, but not so much that you need to understand everything before you begin. The deeper explanations, the small adjustments and the things that can go differently all have their own place elsewhere in The Baking Process.
For now, you are simply going to follow the dough.
Day 1, Morning or Evening: Feed Your Starter
Everything begins with an active starter.
Feed it in time for it to become lively and well risen before you need it. You are looking for a starter that is bubbly, airy and clearly active, ideally around the point where it has reached a strong rise and is approaching or at its peak.
This is one of those moments when learning to read your starter matters more than following a fixed number of hours. A warm kitchen may move things along quickly; a cooler one may take longer. If you are still learning those signs, Reading Your Starter will help you recognise what you are looking for.
Once your starter is active and ready, you can begin.
Day 1: The Autolyse
Combine 500 g flour with 350 g lukewarm water, mixing until all the flour has been hydrated. There is no starter and no salt at this stage.
Cover the bowl and let it rest for 20–60 minutes.
It may seem like nothing is happening, but this quiet pause gives the flour time to absorb the water and the dough time to begin developing before fermentation and salt enter the picture. You do not need to knead it or keep checking on it. Leave it alone and let the dough begin in its own time.
Bringing the Dough Together
After the autolyse, add 100 g active starter and 12 g salt. Work them through the dough until everything is evenly incorporated.
At this point, the dough may feel loose, sticky and rather unpromising. It is easy to look at it and wonder how this is supposed to become a loaf.
Give it time.
The structure will not arrive all at once. Over the next few hours, the dough will gradually become stronger and more cohesive.
Building Strength Through Folding
During the first part of bulk fermentation, you will give the dough a little help by folding it.
Over the next few hours, complete around four rounds of stretch and folds or coil folds, leaving roughly 30 minutes of rest between each round. There is no need to work the dough continuously. A few careful folds, followed by time to rest, are enough.
The change is often easier to feel than to see at first. The dough begins to resist your hands a little more. It becomes smoother and less sticky, and instead of immediately spreading back across the bowl, it starts to gather itself together.
This is one of the lovely things about sourdough: you can actually feel the structure developing beneath your hands.
Bulk Fermentation
After the final fold, leave the dough undisturbed and let fermentation take over. As a starting point, allow around four hours at room temperature, but treat this as a guide rather than a finish line. The actual timing depends on the temperature of your dough and kitchen, the activity of your starter and the flour you are using. For this first loaf, look for roughly 50–75% growth in volume. The dough should feel lighter and more aerated, with bubbles beginning to show through the sides or underneath, and it may start to pull away from the bowl more easily. When you gently shake the bowl, it should have a soft, elastic movement rather than simply sitting heavily in place.
These are the signs that matter more than the number of hours on the clock. If you are unsure whether your dough has fermented enough, Process Control goes deeper into the signals to look for and how to judge them.
Shaping the Loaf
Once bulk fermentation has progressed sufficiently, turn the dough onto a lightly floured work surface and handle it gently. By now, fermentation has created both structure and gas within the dough, so there is no need to press all that air out. Bring the dough together into a loose round or oval and let it rest for around 15 minutes. This short bench rest allows the dough to relax before its final shaping.
Then shape it again, this time creating enough tension across the surface for the loaf to hold its form during the final proof and in the oven. Place it seam-side up in a well-floured banneton and cover it. The loaf now has its final shape, but fermentation is still continuing, and the next stage will give it time to develop further.
The Overnight Cold Proof
Place the covered banneton in the fridge for roughly 8–12 hours. The lower temperature slows fermentation considerably without stopping it completely, while the dough becomes firmer and easier to handle. This makes the loaf easier to turn out and score the following day, while the continued fermentation allows its flavour and structure to develop further.
It is also the first proper pause in the process. After all the mixing, folding and shaping, the dough can simply rest while you leave it to its own devices for the night.
Baking Day: Heat Everything Up
When you are ready to bake, place your Dutch oven in the oven and preheat everything thoroughly to 240–250°C. Give the oven and baking vessel at least 30 minutes to become properly hot, as a well-heated pan helps the dough respond quickly when it goes in. Keep the dough cold while the oven heats; a chilled, firm loaf is generally easier to turn out and score cleanly, and you want to move it from banneton to oven without giving it much opportunity to lose its shape.
Turn Out and Score
When the oven is ready, carefully turn the dough out of the banneton onto a sheet of baking paper, with the smooth side facing upwards. This is the small moment when the loaf finally leaves its basket and you get to see the shape you have been building.
For your first loaf, one clear cut is more than enough. Use a sharp blade and make the score with confidence, giving the dough a controlled place to open as it expands in the oven. There is no need for an elaborate pattern; the loaf already has plenty going on beneath the surface.
Into the Oven
Carefully lower the dough into the hot Dutch oven and put the lid on. Bake for 30 minutes at 240°C with the lid on, then remove the lid, reduce the temperature to 220°C and continue baking for another 20–25 minutes.
During the covered stage, the enclosed steam keeps the surface of the dough supple while the loaf expands, allowing much of the oven spring to happen before the crust sets. Once the lid comes off, the character of the bake changes. The crust begins to dry and deepen in colour, becoming firmer and developing the crispness, aroma and flavour that make a sourdough loaf so satisfying.
By this point, the kitchen should smell considerably better than it did when you started.
The Final Wait
Take the loaf out of the Dutch oven and place it on a wire rack, then give it the time it needs to cool completely before cutting into it. It may be the simplest instruction in the entire process, but it is also one of the hardest to follow when there is a warm loaf sitting in front of you.
As the bread cools, the crumb continues to settle while heat leaves the loaf and moisture redistributes through its structure. Cutting into it too soon can leave the inside feeling damp, sticky or slightly compressed, even when the bread itself has baked successfully. The loaf is still finishing what the oven began, so let it have its final bit of time.
And Then?
Eventually, you get to cut into it. Perhaps the loaf looks exactly as you imagined; perhaps it is a little flatter, darker, tighter or more rustic than expected. The score may have opened beautifully, or it may have found its own way through the crust. The crumb might be wonderfully open, or simply quite good for a first attempt.
None of that changes the most important part: you have made bread.
You started with flour, water and a living culture that you have been feeding and learning to understand. You gave the dough time, handled it gently, watched it change and eventually placed it in a hot oven. The loaf in front of you is the result of everything that happened along the way, including the things you may not yet know how to recognise.
If something did not turn out as expected, resist the temptation to change everything at once. Your loaf is useful information. Look at its shape, crust, crumb, rise and texture, then head to Bread Troubleshooting to explore what those signs might be telling you.
Your first loaf is not a test you pass or fail. It is simply the first time you have gone through the entire process yourself, from a jar of living starter to a loaf on the cooling rack. With the next bake, some of the steps will already feel more familiar. You will begin to recognise when the dough needs another fold, when bulk fermentation is moving along, when the loaf is ready for the fridge and when it is time to bake.
You still follow the process, but gradually, you start to feel it.
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Your First Sourdough Loaf
Follow the steps once. After that, you will start to feel them instead.