Sourdough Doesn't Have To Be Complicated

In their book, Sourdough¹, Casper Andre Lugg and Martin Ivar Hveem Fjeld outline the following steps for baking a basic sourdough bread:

1. Take your starter out of the fridge 24 hours before intending to use it, and feed it.
2. Feed it again after 12 hours.
3. Mix 40g starter with 30g water, 15g sifted wheat, and 15g finely ground spelt.
4. Let it rest for 2-4 hours in room temperature.
5. Temper the water you're going to use to 30 degrees Celsius.
6. Pour the water in with the sourdough mix, and dissolve it with your hands.
7. Mix in the flour, and let it rest for another hour.
8. Pour over 10g of salt, and use your hands to squeeze it into the mixture. Let it rest for 30 minutes.
9. Fold the dough, and let it rest for 30 minutes.
10. Fold the dough, and let it rest for 30 minutes.
11. Fold the dough, and let it rest for 1 hour.
12. Scrape the dough onto a floured surface. Fold the dough over itself a couple of times. There are no less than 15 pictures detailing this step.
13. Sprinkle some flour on top of the dough, and let it rest for 15-25 minutes.
14. Flour your banneton with a 50/50 mix of wheat flour and rice flour.
15. Fold the dough over itself (16 pictures).
16. Flip the dough into the banneton so that the underside is facing up.
17. Let it rest for 1.5-2 hours.
18. Put the dough in the fridge overnight.
19. Bake the bread.

1. Take the starter out of the fridge right when you intend to use it.
2. Mix 100g starter with all the water and flour. Let it rest for 1 hour.
3. Mix in the salt.
4. Let it rest for about 4 more hours.
5. Put the dough in the fridge overnight.
6. Bake the bread.

Their process takes three days, where you are on call for 7.5-10 hours on the day you make the dough. My process takes two days, where you only have to be available for an hour. I don't use a banneton, I just shape the bread on the counter before baking.

I started baking sourdough bread during the pandemic, using Sourdough as a guide. Working from home meant I had the time to do it properly, and my breads came out wonderfully. As we returned to the office, it became impossible, time-wise, to follow the same recipe. My brothers, who had also started baking with sourdough, had begun skipping steps. They told me they couldn't taste the difference in the finished product. I started experimenting with the same process. I slowly started whittling away at all the folding, careful mixing, and complicated steps. The result is the list of six steps above.

The decomplicated approach results in a delicious, airy, sourdough bread with a crispy crust. I might be a simpleton, but I cannot tell the difference.

So why do recipes for sourdough bread involve these intricate steps, while normal bread recipes don't? Is it a form of gatekeeping to scare beginners away from baking with sourdough, so that all the YouTubers and bloggers can make themselves look more skilled? Or is it because sourdough actually is more difficult, and there is a need to leverage all available tools to get it right? I think the boring answer is: both.

There are more reasons a sourdough bread will be difficult to get right compared to a bread made with yeast. According to food science writer Harold McGee, sourdoughs often don't rise as much as other breads because the bacteria in the sourdough culture inhibits the gas production in the bread's yeast. Additionally, the enzymes in the bacteria digest protein, which is what gluten is made of. Combine this with an acidic environment, and you often get a more dense bread².

In practice, however, I rarely run into these problems. Once in a while a bread might turn out a little flat, or slightly dense, but I feel those mishaps happen when the dough has either been underproofed or overproofed. The doughs seem to form enough gluten on their own in a cold-ferment in the fridge.

I know many people take sourdough seriously. I think these people find the hard work rewarding, and enjoy a sense of accomplishment when they make an excellent bread. It's likely that they can taste and feel the difference in the finished product by tweaking some variables, and folding the dough in a certain way. And I think that's great! But baking isn't my hobby. I just want delicious bread with minimal effort. After returning to the office, I no longer have the time to make a bread the way Casper and Ivar want me to. This would restrict my baking time to the weekend only, and I would have to sacrifice other hobbies in favor of babysitting a dough.

I'm not critical of Lugg and Fjeld's book. It contains genuinely good recipes and guides for getting started with sourdough. I'm more sceptical of the thought process that it has to be so difficult, if all you want is good sourdough bread.

If you have been wanting to try your hand at sourdough, but have been intimidated by the complexity; don't be. Try the simplest approach first, and experiment from there. If it doesn't turn out quite right, it's possible that some of the extra steps actually will benefit you. But there is no need to overcomplicate it. Your ancestors sure didn't.