Learn how to make the most perfect, soft and fluffy sourdough sandwich bread! An active sourdough starter gives this bread a beautiful rise without any need for added yeast.
Sourdough breads, like this amazing no-knead sourdough bread, these crusty sourdough rolls, this bread machine sourdough bread and this sourdough olive and sage loaf, are some of my favorite breads to bake. This reader-favorite sourdough sandwich bread, with more than 320 five-star reviews, is on a par with these excellent breads and one I make most often in my kitchen.
The bread turns out just right each time and the recipe makes two sandwich loaves, which last us all week long. And yes, it's mostly white flour, but I don't feel like the devil about it. Research shows that the healthfulness of white sourdough bread exceeds that of wholegrain and multigrain breads.
That's because sourdough has a powerful effect on blood sugar: when left to work its fermenting magic, it breaks down the starches in the foods it's added to, making them easier to digest. Sourdough is also probiotic, which means it is packed with healthy gut bacteria, so you can feel truly holier-than-thou when you smear this bread with some peanut butter or use it to cradle a delicious vegan burger.
Many sourdough breads need to be started a day before, but this sourdough sandwich loaf can easily be made in about eight hours from start to finish, including three rise times. So if you start your bread late in the morning, you can easily have some in time for dinner.
Table of Contents
Why you will love this sourdough sandwich bread
- Buttery and delicious. The sourdough gives the bread a wonderful, buttery flavor in addition to the soft, fluffy texture.
- Healthy bread. Because sourdough starter is fermented, it is full of healthy bacteria that are probiotic and extremely beneficial to the gut microbiome.
- Quick recipe. This bread needs about eight hours of proofing time, total, which is pretty quick for a bread leavened entirely with sourdough and with no added yeast.
- Perfect, fluffy texture. The crust is just lightly chewy and the crumb is soft and fluffy (without any eggs) and just perfect for cradling your favorite sandwich fillings. Stale bread makes great toast.
- Vegan, soy-free, nut-free recipe.
Ingredients
- Sourdough starter: Make sure you use an active, bubbling, recently fed sourdough starter for the best results.
- Unbleached all-purpose flour and whole wheat flour
- Extra virgin olive oil. Or any neutral oil of your choice.
How to make sourdough sandwich bread
Place the sourdough starter in a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer.
Add to it the wholewheat flour, 1 cup of all-purpose flour, and water.
Mix well and set it aside, covered, in a warm place for four hours.
After four hours the starter should be fluffy and bubbly.
Add 2 cups of all-purpose flour, olive oil and salt to the bowl and mix.
Add more flour as needed and knead until the dough becomes quite firm but still feels a little sticky to your fingers. You can do this by hand or in a stand mixer on medium-low speed.
Turn out the dough on a flat surface and knead by hand for 4-5 minutes or until the dough feels smooth and springy. Shape into a ball and place in an oiled bowl, turning the ball of dough around once to coat the top with oil.
Cover tightly with a lid or plastic wrap and let the dough rise for two hours in a warm spot. After two hours it should have doubled.
Punch down the dough and divide into two.
Roll out each half into a rectangle, then roll it like a jelly roll and tuck in the ends to form a loaf. The dough should be very pliable.
Prep two standard loaf pans by spraying lightly with oil and then sprinkling on some cornmeal or semolina. Place the formed loaves in the prepared pans. Cover with a kitchen towel and let them stand in a warm place for at least two more hours or until the dough rises above the top of the loaf pans.
About half an hour before baking, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Place the loaves in the oven and bake 40 minutes. Remove the loaves from the oven, turn them out on a rack, and let them cool thoroughly before slicing.
Top tip
How much water you need for the bread could vary depending on the hydration of your sourdough starter and the weather where you live. If you find that adding two cups of water results in a very sticky dough, reduce the amount of water next time to 1 cup and trickle in the remaining water while kneading the dough, if needed.
Recipe FAQs and troubleshooting
Yes, just halve the amount of ingredients and you are all set!
The culprit here is your sourdough starter. If it is not active and fed recently (as in eight hours to 24 hours before use) you simply won't have enough natural yeast in the starter for the dough to rise.
For a softer crust, replace half the water with soy milk.
Bread flour will give you a crustier loaf and the crumb won't be as soft. But it will still be a pretty good loaf of bread.
Storage instructions
- Refrigerate: The bread can be stored at room temperature for four days and in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
- Freeze: Freeze the bread for up to three months in a freezer-safe bag, whole or sliced.
- Thaw fully before reheating.
More sourdough bread recipes
Sourdough Sandwich Bread Recipe
Equipment
- Large mixing bowl or stand mixer
- 2 loaf pans
Ingredients
- 1½ cups sourdough starter (bubbling and active)
- 1½ cups lukewarm water
- 1 cup whole wheat flour
- 4-5 cups unbleached all purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil (or any neutral oil of your choice)
- 1 teaspoon sea salt (or any salt of your choice)
Instructions
- Place the sourdough starter in a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Add to it the wholewheat flour, 1 cup of all-purpose flour, and water. Mix well and set it aside, covered, in a warm place for four hours.
- Add 2 cups of all-purpose flour, olive oil and salt and mix. Add more flour as you knead until the dough becomes quite firm but still feels a little sticky to your fingers. You can do this by hand or in the stand mixer, using the dough hook attachment, on medium-low speed.
- Turn out the dough on the kitchen platform or any flat surface and knead by hand for 4-5 minutes or until the dough feels smooth and springy to your fingers and barely sticks to the platform.
- Shape into a ball and place in an oiled bowl, turning the ball of dough around once to coat the top with oil.
- Cover tightly and place in a warm spot (like an oven with the light turned on) for at least two hours or until the dough has doubled.
- Punch down the dough and divide into two. Roll out each half into a rectangle, about seven by 10 inches, and roll it up like a jelly roll. With the seam side down, tuck in the ends to form a loaf.
- Prepare two loaf pans by spraying or brushing lightly with oil and then sprinkling on some cornmeal or semolina on the bottom and sides.
- Place the loaves into the prepared loaf pans. Cover with a kitchen towel and let them stand in a warm place for at least two more hours or until the dough domes above the top of the loaf pans.
- About half an hour before baking, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Place the loaves in the oven and bake 40 minutes.
- Remove the loaves from the oven, turn them out on a rack, and let them cool thoroughly before slicing.
Recipe notes
- You can increase salt by another teaspoon if you want to.
- If your sourdough starter is made using someone else's recipe, you may need more or less water to form the dough. In that case add 1 cup water in step 1 and trickle in more as needed when kneading the dough in step 2.
Jane
Is it possible to replace the whole wheat flour with something like chickpea flour?
Vaishali
Hi Jane, it would really not work with chickpea flour because there's no gluten to help the bread build structure. Also the sourdough anyway has wheat in it. If you want to avoid most, but not all, wheat, you might try this with a gluten-free bread flour. If you do, I'd be interested in hearing how it turns out. You might want to keep some things in mind while modifying the recipe. I have a few tips in this post: https://holycowvegan.net/gluten-free-sandwich-bread/
Anonymous
Is standard loaf pan an 8"?
Vaishali
Yes, 8 or even 9 would be fine.
Bryn
Hello, just tried this as my first actual loaf! Happy to say I got a significant rise, but when I pulled them out they were rock solid! Wah wah waaaaaah! What could I have done wrong?
Bryn
Ok, wait a minute - as it's cooling it's getting softer!
Bryn
Now my question is - how to store it best?
Vaishali
Hi Bryn, you can store it in the refrigerator, in a plastic bag, like the ones you get when you buy storebought bread.
Ima
Hi, I wanna try this recipe but my starter is not quite ripe yet. Also I use 100% hydration (100 grams water to 100 grams red whole wheat flour). Should I adjust the recipe or just try it's it is?
Thanks
Vaishali
Hi Ima, you will need to adjust your starter because these measurements are for the starter made with the amount of hydration given in the recipe.
Joanna Burke
Will try this recipe! I only ever make sourdough boules so I'm excited to try a sandwich loaf.
I did want to mention that the King Arthur Flour starter recipe is 100% hydration. 1/2 cup of water and 1 cup of flour are volume measurements and they have different densities but when flour is measured correctly (using the"fluff and sprinkle" method rather than scooping) they are roughly the same weight (about 4oz) and mass. A lot of bread bakers weigh or mass everything because it's more accurate and it's easier than using cup measures. If yours is perfect with more water, I would guess you are scooping your flour and therefore actually getting more flour than they intended, which is why adding water brought it back to the hydration it should be. There's a video from King Arthur Flour about the difference in amount of flour here: .
Hope that's interesting and/or helpful! If that's obvious, just ignore me. Chemist wife syndrome. ?
-Joanna
Michael
Thank you for pointing this out. I was surprised to see that she didn’t use weight to measure the ingredients.
Shalini
I have another question.. lol. Sorry, I'm a newbie at baking. Well, in a recipe like yours that states 1 1/2 cups of sourdough starter, what happens if the hydration levels of my starter is different from yours? Thanks again haha 🙂
Vaishali
Hey there, that's the reason I state that you use sourdough with the same hydration as mine: 1 cup flour to 3/4 cup water. Otherwise you will have to increase/decrease the amount of flour and water in your recipe, which could change the bread significantly.
Shalini
Ohh.. okay. I'll follow your measurements for the starter next time 🙂 thanks
Shalini
Also, what size loaf pan did you use?
Thanks again 🙂
Vaishali
Hey Shalini, I use 8-inch by 4-inch loaf pans.The color of the crust depends on the pan you're using. A darker pan gives you a darker crust.
Shalini
The top of my bread was pale, it looked uncooked even though it actually was well-cooked.. I don't understand the relation of the color of the pan to the color of the crust, do you mean the part that's covered by the pan, like the lower part of the bread?
Fyre
Shalini - dark pans absorb more energy (light, heat, what-have-you) than light or clear pans. So in effect, they're hotter? You might consider turning up the temperature of your oven 15-20*F for the browning phase at the end.
Troy Clement
I love this recipe it makes beautiful loaves, right now I am making a batch with ancient grains added cant wait.
Vaishali
Sounds delicious! Thanks for the feedback.
Shalini
Hi,
I baked this today and the crust didn't turn brown at all like in your pictures. What kind of oven do you use? Thanks 🙂
joe
I made this today and it turned fantastic. Tkls.
Vaishali
Thanks for letting me know, Joe! Glad you enjoyed it.
Anusha
Sam 🙂 Sammy boy 🙂
Vaishali
I love that name because it was also the name of my first dog. I've already picked the name though-- George. 🙂 Thanks, Anusha.
l7171
Your bread sounds wonderful
and about to try baking it now,
thank you for making it possible.
Vaishali
Awesome, hope you like it!
Vidya
How about Bianca? Since it's white and all?! 🙂
Vaishali
Thanks for the suggestion, Vidya. Definitely in the running. ?
Niki
Sounds amazing! Any idea if I could use gf flours? Any specific ones?
Thanks so much for sharing your awesome recipes!!
Vaishali
Niki, that's an interesting question. You can make a glutenfree sourdough and there is a recipe on the King Arthur blog but it uses a special starter. I also have seen versions with kefir which of course would not be vegan. If you're looking for a glutenfree sandwich bread, although not a sourdough one, you might want to try this: https://holycowvegan.net/gluten-free-sandwich-bread/
Rakesh Saxena
Superb!!!!
Vaishali
?
ChannonD
George...as in "I want to hug him and squeeze him and call him George" The classic line from Bugs Bunny's take on "Of Mice and Men". Makes me giggle every time.
How does one "feed" their starter and "keep it alive"? I LOVE sourdough bread, but whole grain versions are hard to find. I'd love to make some, but my disability makes that only possible on occasions. So, given that, I'm not sure if I'm a good candidate for creating, feeding and loving my very own George.
Namrata
Yeah George gets my vote too. It's such a good name for a sourdough starter <3
Plus naming your starter is such a cute concept, love it!! The bread looks lovely btw, I don't bake anything more complicated than cookies so I won't probably be making this, but I will ask my friend to bake some 🙂
Thanks, this post makes me so happy, especially the naming part !!
Vaishali
Hope your friend bakes it for you, Namrata. 🙂
Vaishali
Love George! He is seriously in the running. Channon, I have a few whole wheat sourdough breads on the blog but I am in the process of developing an all whole wheat recipe with sourdough only.
Girija
Sivaay 🙂
Vaishali
?? ?
giri
Si from Desi, Va from your name and ay from Jay 🙂 name for you new starter
Vaishali
Haha, that's a good one. 🙂 Love it!
Diane
I have had a time getting this bread recipe to work right. Seems so simple and I’ve made lots of sourdough bread but it is so sticky and takes a long time to rise. Any suggestions?
Francie Colby
you do not need this recipe over night?