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.
Lois
Hello I was excited to find your recipe. I have a good starter that is currently in the refrigerator that I would need to feel to get to 1 1/2 cups. I wanted to know if bread flour can be used for part of or all of recipe as I have a bit of that kind of flour. Also I currently can’t eat whole wheat flour so I wanted to know if it is ok to use all purpose or bread flour in place of the 1 cup of whole wheat. Thank you!
Vaishali
Yes, bread flour is fine!
Joslynn B
This turned out so good! My first couple loaves for attempts at artisan sourdough. This was much quicker and turned out great! My family really likes it. Definitely will do this one again
Linda D Noack
Hi, I wanted to know if I can correct my issue. I am on day 7 of making the sourdough starter and I misread your notes on how to make the starter. I was removing 1/2 cup of starter in the morning and then adding 1/2 cup of flour and 3/4 cup of filtered water to the starter. I think mine is a bit runny but it is definitely bubbling. Can I go ahead and add more flour and a little less water now and get it to a good consistency? thanks
Vaishali
Yes, absolutely. Your starter isn't going to go bad just because you added more water. Add more flour and let it come back to a thicker consistency. 🙂
Linda D Noack
Thank you, I just added extra flour. I'm so excited to make some bread. I have made waffles out of the discard every day. I printed up your sourdough recipes and am going to get going on them this week.
Trina
I have been working on my starter for a month. The weather is getting warmer so it finally rose like it should. I am trying this recipe now but I don't have 1 1/2 cups starter. I cut back on the amount of flour and water but not sure if I did it right. I guess I will find out in four hours. Also what causes a starter to go past it's prime.
Mila
Just got my starter going yesterday and can't wait to try this recipe....thank you very much. Can I use only white all purpose flour in this recipe? Also if I don't bake one week or I will be away, do I just refrigerate the starter or freeze it to temporarily stop it from growing?
Collin
Could I substitute the whole wheat flour with rye flour?
Vaishali
Rye would make it a tad more dense and heavier than whole wheat, but since the proportion of all purpose flour is much bigger it could work. Let me know how it goes.
Sharon RC
I started making our own bread several months ago and my husband doesn't want the bought bread anymore. I have to go mostly gluten free but did start using a sourdough starter. I have a simple recipe that turns out really well and I use a bread machine. So easy to get a loaf going and it takes under a little over 3 hours to complete. I add to my starter and refrigerate it until ready to make another loaf. I let it sit out for a couple hours before starting a loaf.
Christina
Can I ask how you use this recipe in the bread maker? Do u just add ingredients and start the bread process? I’ve only made bread with prepackaged yeast once and now my son is asking To make it with his own starter. He is 13. He is not gluten free, I am. Do u also make gluten free bread?
Anonymous
Would love to know what that recipe is. I don't want to take all day making bread. I use the machine but not with sourdough
Chris
I'd like to know your recipe also please.
I'm on my second try of this and it still does not seem right.
Would love to just put everything in the bread machine.
Ingrid
Would you please share your bread machine recipe that you make.
Sarah
Sadly I totally failed at this recipe! My starter was nice and healthy or at least so I thought, but the dough just kept getting stickier and stickier as I kneaded it so I put it in the refrigerator to rest overnight then shaped it and put it in the pan to rise in the morning. It rose almost to the top of the pan and then I moved it, but when I put it down part of the dough fell, any guesses what I could have done wrong? It's like the whole thing deflated. I read one article that said I could reknead and reshape the dough so I tried that but then it never rose again.
I probably just don't know bread well enough at this point, I am using a starter branched off from a friend's and I have successfully baked one round traditional sourdough loaf out of it.
Vaishali
This is why I say, time and again, that you need to follow instructions especially if you're new at baking. The dough just needs a two-hour first rise, so putting it in the refrigerator overnight --where it will continue to rise, albeit slowly -- might have resulted in too long a rise time, especially if your starter was strong. If your dough was sticky, you can try it with less water next time--the weather where you are, the humidity could all make a difference to how much liquid your bread needs. And finally, remember practice makes you a better baker, so stick with it.
chris
I just made this for the second time cuz my first one failed the dough seems way too sticky and I'm afraid to put too much more flour in as the recipe calls for I'm at the maximum flower this time and even put another small handful because it was still very very sticky.
I'm usually not into videos most cooking is simple but this if you're not used to baking bread would be nice to have a video to see the consistency it supposed to be.
Did you make your round out of this recipe and just form round and bake it at the same temperature ,not in the Dutch oven like some of them do?
Vaishali
Try kneading it for longer next time or try using less water or a combination of both. Dough can remain sticky if not kneaded long enough for the gluten strands to develop.
Nicole
I started a starter last week and am looking forward to trying this. If I want to do an overnight rise, can I just refrigerate it for the second rise?
Thanks!
Carmen
You should be able to do that with any yeast bread, including sourdough. It's what I did because it got too late. I will let you know how it goes!
Diane
Has anyone used this with bread flour instead of all purpose? Wondering how it would change it?
Deepti vishwanath
Hi Vaishali am new to sourdough concept..i made my starter with 100%hydration. Now i want to try my hands on baking a loaf. I saw your recipe felt very nice and relatively easy in comparison to other recipies. But your quantity is more .
Can you please guide me here how to go with small quantity of flour and starter.. hope you can help me here..
Anonymous
Hi pls reply
Anonymous
This recipe is amazing, thank you!
I fed my sourdough starter the night before and started the recipe around 7am and had the bread out around 4. Turned out amazing! Wife and kids love it!
Maria Aggelina
I will give it a try tonight.Im tired of giving store bought bread to my kids. Than you so much for this recipe. Greetings from Greece.
SB
I have made my bread. It has a very good taste. However the crust is very tough and chewy. Is there a way to make it softer and more pleasing to the pallet?
Vaishali
Hi, you can use nondairy milk instead of water for a softer crust--replace all or part of the water with soymilk or almond milk.
Amy Patrick
As soon as it comes out of the oven, rub the top generously with butter. Soft crust every time!
Deborah
Yes! I'm a regular bread maker and ALWAYS brush my buns and loaves with a honey butter mix right after they come out of the oven. This softens the crust as well as gives it a mild sweetness. This tip makes a HUGE difference in how quickly they disappear. Dont brush it on before, it deflates the bread and tends to make soggy.
chris dattilio
Hi ,I'm new to this and Soo many questions.
Can this be made with discard?
It's listed under 5 recipes to use the discard for but doesnt say discard or unfed starter in ingredients like others do.
Also ,can u use discard from day two the same as discard day 6 ?
Can I take the discard and put in fridge a day or two till I use it?
Thank you!
Vaishali
Yes, so long as the starter has been fed about 5-6 days prior to baking and is strong.
Carmen
You can use discard right away while it is still active. If you put it in the fridge, you will have feed it to activate it again. If you put a little blob of starter in a cup of water and it floats, it is ready to bake.
Susan
Can I use a sourdough starter I already have? It's not thevsame as your recipe, but similar.
Lee
I have made it with my starter which is not the same. Turned out fine.
Kenleigh
If I only want to make one loaf at a time, is it possible to refrigerate half of the dough at some point in the process to bake later? At what point in the process would be the best to do this? Thanks!
Lee
I just cut the recipe in half and only mix up for one loaf
Carmen
You will want to freeze it to bake later. It will continue to rise, albeit very slowly, in the fridge.