Easiest Sourdough Bread

Dough

For the Banneton

Pantry swaps

Method

1. Day before baking (optional but recommended), prepare a banneton: rinse a new one, set it aside a few minutes until it is damp but not dripping, then dust it evenly with 100% rice flour, all the way up to the edges. Let it dry at least 24 hours. A seasoned banneton just needs a light re-dust with rice flour.

2. Mix the dough the morning of the day before you plan to bake. In a bowl combine 350 g bread flour, 150 g sprouted whole wheat flour, 10 g (2 tsp) Himalayan pink salt, 50 g unfed starter straight from the fridge, and 330 g room-temperature water. Mix just until the dough comes together – it will be lumpy and bumpy, and that is fine.

3. Let the dough rest 30-60 minutes. As the flour absorbs the water the dough becomes less sticky and easier to work with.

4. (Optional starter maintenance for the next bake) Feed the starter with 20 g dark rye flour and 30 g water – a 1:1.5 flour-to-water ratio, since rye absorbs more water than white flour. Use a standard 1:1 ratio if you keep your starter on white flour. Leave it at room temperature for the rest of the day, then refrigerate it until the next bake.

5. After the rest, work out any clumps and form the dough into a ball.

6. Bulk ferment at room temperature for the rest of the day. Come back every 1-3 hours for 3-4 rounds of gentle folds; the timing does not need to be exact. By evening the dough is more elastic, aerated, and smells slightly sour.

7. Shape the loaf: stretch the dough out slightly, fold it in thirds, rotate it 90 degrees, and roll it into a tight log. Pinch the seam and the sides closed, and pop any large surface bubbles – they just expand and burn in the oven.

8. Rest the dough seam side down on the board for about 20 minutes.

9. Dust the top of the dough with a little bread flour, then transfer it to the prepared banneton seam side up. Pull the edges and stitch them toward the center – like tightening a corset – to build surface tension. You do not need a banneton: at this point you can instead transfer the dough to the baking vessel and let it proof overnight in that.

10. Proof overnight at room temperature (about 61-66 F / 16-19 C). If your home is warmer, do the final proof overnight in the fridge instead.

11. Next morning the dough should have risen about 1 inch above the rim of the banneton. Score the loaf immediately before baking with a razor, sharp knife, or scissors: one slightly curved cut from the middle of the top to the middle of the bottom, blade slanted at 45 degrees, at least 1/2 inch deep.

12. Bake at 425 F (218 C) for 50-55 minutes total: 30 minutes with the cover on (traps steam for oven spring and the ear), then 20-25 minutes uncovered until the crust is browned. Rosie bakes in two 9 x 13 inch baking pans with one pan as the cover; a Dutch oven works the same way. Cool on a wire rack before slicing.

Notes

Servings: 12 (1 slice of 1 loaf). Per serving (estimated): 155 kcal, 31 g carbs, 5 g protein, 1 g fat, 3 g fiber.

All quantities come from the narrated video and the creator’s written description and are exact. This is a genuinely beginner-friendly sourdough: no discard, no feeding before mixing, no kneading, and only 15 minutes of hands-on prep spread over about 24 hours.

The key trick is using unfed cold starter straight from the fridge in place of active starter. The trade-off is time – the less active starter needs about 24 hours to ferment – but the long, cool fermentation develops flavor and gluten structure without heavy kneading or complex folds.

Room temperature drives the schedule. Rosie’s home runs 61-66 F (16-19 C), so an overnight room-temperature proof works. In a warmer house, proof overnight in the fridge so the dough does not over-proof before morning.

The banneton is optional. Dust a new one with rice flour a day ahead (rice flour does not absorb into the dough the way wheat flour does), or skip it entirely and proof the shaped loaf directly in the pan you will bake in. A loaf pan also works – Rosie links a separate loaf-pan version of the recipe.

The starter feeding in step 4 is maintenance for future bakes, not part of this loaf – it simply replenishes the 50 g you used.

Nutrition is estimated from standard USDA values for the flours; the creator gives no macros. Fiber comes mostly from the whole wheat flour. The sprouted whole wheat can be swapped for regular whole wheat 1:1 with no other changes.