Sourdough French Bread

This is the sourdough French bread of your dreams - chewy, crusty exterior with a light, airy crumb. It pairs well with pretty much anything ... or just enjoy with good quality cheese and a glass of wine!

Course Bread

Cuisine French

Keyword Sourdough Bread

Prep Time 1

Cook Time 30

Fermentation Time 12

Total Time 13 30

Servings Loaves

Calories 2719kcal

Ingredients

100 g Sourdough Starter (fed and bubbly - see notes)
280 g Water
30 g Granulated Sugar
80 g Olive Oil
500 g Bread Flour
10 g Salt

Instructions

Add the sourdough starter, sugar, olive oil and warm water to a large mixing bowl. Stir together to break up the sourdough starter and dissolve the sugar (the oil will not mix and that's ok).
Now add the bread flour and salt and bring together into a shaggy dough. Cover the dough with a damp towel or plastic food cover and allow it to sit for around one hour.
Now, tip the dough onto a clean surface and knead it until it is smooth and elastic. This dough will be slightly sticky but try not to add too much flour or your dough will become dry and this will affect your sourdough French bread when it's baked. Try to knead it for around 5 to 10 minutes by hand.
You can do this step in a stand mixer on low speed (using a dough hook) or a Thermomix using the knead function.
Once the dough is sufficiently kneaded, place it back into the bowl and cover. Allow it to sit until it has risen around 30 to 50%. You don't want it to double for this recipe or it will be too difficult to shape.
When the dough is ready, tip it onto a clean surface and divide it in half using a bench scraper.
Pull the dough into a rough square and gently roll it into a log. Pinch the ends and use a dough scraper to transfer to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Cover your shaped sourdough French Bread with a damp towel and place in a warm spot to rise. You want the dough to double in size now and become super puffy.
When you are ready to bake your Sourdough French Bread, preheat your oven to 220C (428F). Ideally you should introduce some steam into your oven to get a true French crust on your bread. You can do this a few different ways (I have added notes at the bottom of the recipe card to give you some methods for this).
Bake your French Bread for around 25 to 30 minutes (removing the steam for the last 10 minutes of the bake to allow the crust to get crunchy).
Remove the bread from the oven when it's baked (check that it sounds hollow to ensure it's done). Allow it cool on a wire rack.
For an extra shine on your loaf, brush with butter when it first comes out of the oven. This is completely optional.

Notes

Sourdough Starter - feed your sourdough starter a few hours before you want to make this bread and ensure that it has doubled before adding it to the bowl.

Using Sourdough Discard - if you want to use sourdough discard for this bread, use 100g of sourdough discard and some yeast. Add 2-3g for a slower rise and more flavor. Add up to 7g for a fast rise (but you won't get the same flavor).

Sugar - the sugar in this loaf contributes to the texture and golden crust of this loaf. You can leave it out if you wish, however you won't get the same result shown.

Kneading - you can easily knead this dough by hand. It will be a little sticky to start with, but keep going and it will come together into an elastic dough. It will still be slightly sticky to touch - don't add extra flour or you'll lose the texture of the bread when it's baked.

You can also knead this dough in a stand mixer using a dough hook at a low speed (no more than speed 2) or in a Thermomix using the dough knead function for around 5 minutes.

Adding steam to your bake - ideally you should introduce some steam into your oven to ensure you get a chewy but crispy crust (like all good French Bread). There are a number of ways you can do this:

add an oven safe dish filled with water to the lower rack of your oven. Do this around half way through preheat so that it's sufficiently steamy when you add your bread dough. Remove any excess water after 15 minutes (please be very careful doing this and use high heat resistant gloves).
throw 4 or 5 ice cubes into the bottom of your oven when you add the bread. Quickly close the door so that the steam is trapped inside as the ice melts.
You can also find some ideas for adding steam in this post about baking sourdough bread without a Dutch Oven.

The bread in these photos has been baked in a steam oven. My oven has a reservoir that allows me to add water when I turn the oven on. This creates a steamy environment to bake my bread.

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