An artisanal loaf of No Knead Sourdough Bread that takes almost no skill and minimal amount of hands-on time. If you love making sourdough breads, this is one you absolutely want to try! All you need for this recipe is two ingredients -- a quality sourdough starter and flour. The bread is crusty with a tender, airy crumb and a delicious flavor.
If making bread seems like a lot of work to you, I have for you today the perfect solution: my No Knead Sourdough Bread.
This is really one of my favorite bread recipes, and one everyone at home loves, including my 9-year-old, Jay. He loves eating it fresh and once it's a day old, I toast it up for him and he loves it even more. Because with a dab of vegan butter, this bread is heaven itself.
I started out with a recipe from Sam Sifton, but over the weeks I've tried different versions of it, including a part whole-wheat one that is ridiculously good, although not as airy as the version made entirely with white bread flour. It does pack in a ton of flavor, though. You can rest easy even if you make your bread with all white flour because the probiotic microflora in the sourdough slow down the rate at which glucose is released into the blood-stream, making sourdough bread -- yeah even white sourdough bread -- rank lower on the glycemic index.
The best part about making this bread is, I don't even need to refer back to the recipe. The ingredients couldn't be simpler or more basic and therefore easy to remember.
Ingredients for no-knead sourdough bread:
- Sourdough starter (here's the recipe, if you don't already have one. My starter uses ¾th cup of water for each cup of flour).
- Flour
- Salt and water
The only real work is mixing up the ingredients, but you can do it all in one bowl and set it aside to rise. Couldn't be easier. You do need some time for the sourdough to do its magic, but it's all hands-off time and some things are worth waiting for, aren't they?
The dough needs two rises. One is a longer, overnight rise, and the second is a shorter, two-hour rise. You will need a dutch oven or a heavy, oven-safe pot with a lid to bake the bread. My dutch oven is not enameled on the inside, but it works just great. You will also need some parchment paper or a kitchen towel for the second rise, with parchment a much better option.
I won't keep you waiting any longer for the recipe, but I hope you will try this loaf. If you do, I guarantee you'll love it. Be sure, as always, to follow instructions precisely. I am not a stickler for following recipe instructions, and I don't ask that you do that with mine except when you're baking.
Here's the recipe. Happy baking -- and breaking -- some delicious No Knead Sourdough Bread!
Looking for more sourdough and bread recipes:
- The Best Sourdough Sandwich Bread
- Vegan Sourdough Challah
- Vegan Olive Oil Brioche
- Crusty French Bread
- No Knead Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread
- Bread Machine Sourdough Bread
No Knead Sourdough Bread
Ingredients
- ¾ cup sourdough starter (unfed is fine, but it should have been fed at least within a week of baking the bread)
- 1 ¼ cups water (use distilled or non-chlorinated water for bread, especially sourdough breads)
- 3 ½ cups bread flour (can replace 1 cup of the bread flour with whole wheat flour. The bread will be less airy but still delicious)
- 1 teaspoon sea salt or kosher salt
Instructions
- In a large bowl, mix the sourdough starter with the water, then add the flour and salt and mix until a consistent but sticky dough forms. You can do this by hand or in your stand mixer.
- Cover the bowl with cling wrap and let the dough rise overnight or 8-10 hours.
- Turn the risen dough onto the kitchen counter and form it into a ball as best as you can. If the dough is hard to handle, flour your hands but resist the temptation to add more flour. You want a dough with higher hydration or water content for a light, airy loaf. Adding too much flour will make your bread dense. Even if your dough doesn't form into a perfect loaf, it will shape up nicely during baking in the dutch oven.
- Prepare a sheet of parchment paper by sprinkling liberally with flour. If you don't have parchment, you can use a kitchen towel sprinkled with flour, but keep in mind that there is a much higher chance of your dough deflating when it rises on a kitchen towel because it will more likely stick to the towel. Place the parchment paper or kitchen towel on a baking sheet.
- Transfer the dough onto the parchment paper or kitchen towel, seam side down. Cover (I use the bowl I mixed the dough in), and let it rise another two hours.
- About half an hour before your bread is done rising for the second time, preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Place a heavy cast-iron or other oven-safe pot in the oven with the lid on. (I use a 3.2 quart dutch oven that is not enameled on the inside. Enameled is even better.)
- Once the dough has risen, carefully remove your heated pot from the oven. Quickly, in a smooth motion, turn the dough into the pot so that the seam side now faces up. A parchment paper makes this much easier because the dough slides off more smoothly. Be very careful doing all this because the pot is very hot. If you find turning the bread into the dutch oven difficult to do without deflating it, you can just transfer the bread into the dutch oven with the parchment paper (don't do this if you used a kitchen towel).
- Put the lid back on the pot and bake for 30 minutes. Take off the lid and continue baking the bread for another 20 minutes. The bread will split at the top and char a little, which I love because the charring adds even more flavor.
- Once the loaf is baked, remove to a rack and let it cool about half an hour before carefully removing it from the pot. Let the loaf continue cooling on a rack. Slice and serve, or tear it apart with your bare hands (which you just might want to do because who has time for niceties when there's a delicious loaf of bread to be eaten 😉 ).
Vaishali
You really need to use the parchment paper, like I say in the instructions. Otherwise you can't lift it out without deflating it. Please follow instructions.
Allison C
I made a loaf of this bread over the weekend and it turned out beautifully! Like many others, the dough was super sticky and spread out as it rose. But that did not seem to matter. I used parchment paper and then set that down into the hot dutch oven. It rose well, looked similar to the pictures, nice big air holes and great flavor, cannot say enough about how it turned out. My crust on the bottom was a little tough to cut, but as I make this bread I'll likely figure out how to tweak the bake time and oven rack position to optimize it.
THANK YOU!!
Vaishali
Awesome to hear!
Kellyanne Matt
Hi
for the overnight prove is this on the counter or in the fridge please?
Thanks
Vaishali
On the counter.
Alma
I put an old cookie sheet on the bottom rack in the oven as it is heating. My no knead loaves also had a bottom crust that was near impossible to cut. This has eliminated that problem for me.
Bren
This is my second attempt at this bread. Like others I had some problems with the dough being wetter than expected, but it raised fine and I was happy with results. But, both times, the crust is extremely hard—have to work hard to get a serrated breed knife to break through it.
Anybody else have this problem? Any ideas for a solution?
Further info: I am baking this in a small (chicken size) enameled roasting pan because it’s the only lidded pan that I have that will take this heat. The second loaf was baked with a pan of water once I removed the lid, but I don’t see any difference.
Would love to perfect this recipe! I have some starter that began in Alaska over 120 years ago so I’d like to do it justice. ? Thanks for any help.
Joe
120 year old starter...Amazing!
Vaishali
Hi Bren, how wonderful -- a 120 year old starter! This is supposed to be a crusty bread, so the crust will be hard. You can add some butter to the recipe to soften it a bit. I just pop it in the microwave or toaster oven for a few seconds to make it easier to slice the next day.
Jane
I was skeptical. We've never enjoyed supermarket sourdough bread, which we found too dense with an off-flavor. But we missed our homemade peasant bread, a New York Times recipe not unlike this one, but leavened with yeast, which I made twice a week. We now have a new favorite, courtesy of Vaishali and Mario, Andrew’s dad and a hero of mine. Despite being a little overhydrated, Mario performed beautifully and produced a golden tasty loaf, only a little spread out. Thank you so much!
Question: I have about 1/2 cup of Mario left. Do I build him up starting all over again now or place in fridge and build up gradually?
Vaishali
Hi Jane, that's so great to hear. Yes, please start building up your starter again by feeding it.
Juliann
My first try: not a bad rise, about 3.5” high when it came out of the oven. My first rise was good, but like others, my second rise it hardly rose at all. Perhaps because I let my first rise go 12 hours? (I forgot about it in the morning). I also used white all purpose flour. Not a bad loaf, just not as large as in the photos. Nice crust and still air pockets inside. Any suggestions for next time? How do you keep it from deflating between first and second rises? Perhaps post a video of how you handle it in between rises?
Vaishali
Hi Juliann, an eight-hour rise is optimal for the first rise. It will deflate after you handle it before the second rise. When you turn it back into the dutch oven, if you find it hard to do, just put the loaf into the dutch oven with the parchment and then put the lid on.
Sandra
Can you keep the dough on the parchment and lift the parchment with the dough into the dutch oven? it's how I've been making regular no knead bread and it works well. Thanks!
Vaishali
Yes! Absolutely.
Lezlee
Hi, Thank you for the SD starter recipe. My daughter & I started feeding our starter last weekend. Tonight we mixed up the no knead SD bread. I'm hoping our starter is ready! A couple of quick questions... 1. I have a cast iron Dutch oven I use when camping. I usually use a liner when baking in it. Can I use a liner with the bread? If not, should it be greased with oil so it doesn't stick? 2. It says to preheat oven to 500°. Is that the temperature for baking the bread for the entire time?
Thanks again! Hoping for success!
Vaishali
If this is just a regular cast iron Dutch oven no need to oil, I am not sure what a liner is. And yes, you do need to bake throughout at 500 degrees F.
Tess
could you share a picture of what the dough looks like? I followed this recipe to a T, but my dough was so sticky it couldn’t hold a shape. and despite the gorgeous huge rise it did overnight, it did not rise very much at all for the second rise (it almost completely flattened when I transferred it to parchment paper). in lieu of a picture I’d appreciate any other advice you have for that. Thank you!
Vaishali
It sounds like you deflated your dough when you transferred it from the parchment. Like I say in the instructions you need to be very careful when you do that. It may not rise much the second time but so long as you don't deflate it, it should rise even higher during baking because of "oven spring."
Barb
I had a very similar problem as Tess. My overnight rise was excellent. It seems that when I removed it from the bowl, it deflated severely and never really regained any rise. I baked it anyway to see if it would get any rise in the oven but didn't happen. Tastes wonderful but it's less than 2 inches in height. Any hints. Planning to try again soon.
Vaishali
Hi Barb, when did you last feed the starter? It could be that the starter you are using is simply not strong enough. While you can use unfed starter here, it should have been fed less than a week before. You can just feed your starter about six hours before baking the next time.
Elaina
I only have all purpose flour, is that ok to use- instead of bread flour?
Vaishali
Yes, that's fine!
Melissa
Hi Vaishali,
Thanks for this beautiful and easy bread recipe.
I'm new to SD bread and am ready to try yours except my very old Le Creuset dutch oven can only go up to a temp of 450 which is the temp the other SD bread recipes I baked called for.
Can I try to bake your bread at 450? And, if so, should I make any other tweaks in the recipe.
Thanks, Melissa
Kate
This is probably a really dumb question, but I'm a newbie to baking in a dutch oven! When you add your dough to the dutch oven, do you put the whole thing back in the oven? Or is the oven just to get the dutch oven hot, and the dough bakes directly in that outside of the oven? Thanks!!
Vaishali
You need to put the dutch oven back in the oven! The heat of the dutch oven is not enough to bake the bread.
Courtney Knight
Thank you so much for writing this down, I had a very successful result!
Question: I was wanting to use this recipe to make sandwich bread and put it in a loaf pan. Is that doable? Should I change anything up?
Again, much obliged! 🙂
Vaishali
You can follow my sandwich bread recipe here:https://holycowvegan.net/best-sourdough-sandwich-bread-yeast-free/
lori natoli
Hi
I have just finished making my starter for the sourdough and have mixed my dough for the loaf. My oven doesn’t reach 500 F it maxes out at 480 F , what should I do ? I do have a Weber bbq should I bake my loaf in that ?
Regards
Lori
Vaishali
Just bake at 480 and increase baking time by about 5-10 mins. You may not get as much of a rise in the oven but overall should be okay.
Anonymous
Ok got it. ?
Ave Bonar
You do not say at what point to save back starter for the next baking. I assume it has to be before salt is added since salt will kill the yeast. And I assume it would be 3/4 c. since that's what the recipe calls for. Can you please clarify?
Vaishali
Look at the sourdough starter recipe for instructions on feeding. Always replace proportionate to what you removed. https://holycowvegan.net/make-sourdough-starter/
John
Can I use my starter straight out of the fridge or do I have to add flour and water stir and wait till it rises regards John
Vaishali
For this bread, you can use the starter straight out of the fridge, so long as you have fed it at least a week earlier.
Laura
So do I use my discard starter straight from the fridge? Or do I need to set starter out ( not feeding it) until the next day when I make the dough?
Vaishali
Straight from fridge is fine.