Veronique's best sourdough bread (revised 2/28/25)

Good

% Daily Values based on a 2,000 calorie diet

Step 1

Day 1 - 6 pm: Make the levain with: 20 g active starter 200 g water 100 g whole wheat flour 100 g bread flour Make the leaven: The night before baking, discard all but 1 tablespoon of the mature starter (20 g) Mix the remaining starter with 200 grams of warm water and stir with your hand to disperse. Mix 100g of each flour together and add to the bowl. Combine well. Cover with a towel and let rest at room temperature (in oven if cold temperature) for 12 hours or until aerated and puffed in appearance. To test for readiness, drop a tablespoon of leaven into a bowl of room-temperature water; if it floats it’s ready to use. If it doesn’t, allow more time to ferment.

Step 2

Make the dough: In a large bowl, combine 200 grams of levain with 700 grams of warm water and stir to disperse. (Reserve remaining levain for future loaves)

Step 3

Add 900 grams of white-bread flour and 100 grams of whole-wheat flour to bowl and use your hands to mix until no traces of dry flour remain. The dough will be sticky and ragged. Cover bowl with a towel and let dough rest for 25 to 40 minutes at room temperature.

Step 4

Add 20 grams fine sea salt and 50 grams warm water. Use hands to integrate salt and water into dough thoroughly. The dough will begin to pull apart, but continue mixing; it will come back together.

Step 5

Cover dough with a towel and transfer to a warm environment, 75 to 80 degrees ideally (like near a window in a sunny room, or inside a turned-off oven). Let dough rise for 30 minutes. Fold dough by dipping hand in water, taking hold of the underside of the dough at one quadrant and stretching it up over the rest of the dough. Repeat this action 3 more times, rotating bowl a quarter turn for each fold. Do this every half-hour for 2 1/2 hours more (3 hours total). The dough should be billowy and increase in volume 20 to 30 percent. If not, continue to let rise and fold for up to an hour more.

Step 6

Flour the counter top and pour the dough out of the bowl using a scraper. Dust top with flour. Use the scraper to cut dough into 2 equal pieces. Fold the cut side of each piece up onto itself so the flour on the surface remains entirely on the outside of the loaf; this will become the crust. Work dough into taut rounds. Place the dough rounds on a work surface, cover with a towel, and let rest 30 minutes.

Step 7

After 30 minutes, dust the top with whole wheat flour. Use the scraper to flip it over onto a butcher board and shape into a boule or batard. For batard: Make a rough rectangle. Fold the bottom third onto itself. Fold each side into thirds. Fold the top and pushing with your thumbs keep rolling from the top down.

Step 8

Dust banneton generously with a mix of whole wheat and rice flour. Place the boule or batard in the banneton seam side up. Cover with the shower caps and refrigerate overnight.

Step 9

Day 2: 8 am - take out of the fridge and bring back to room temperature

Step 10

Place a pizza stone in the oven and the dutch oven and preheat at 500 deg F for 30 minutes.

Step 11

Prepare a square piece of parchment paper, place it on a pizza peel. Flip the boule onto it. Score as desired.

Step 12

Place immediately into the hot dutch oven. Cover and place in the oven. Reduce temperature to 450F and bake 20 minutes.

Step 13

Remove lid and bake another 20 minutes.

Step 14

Transfer to a wire rack and cool 2 hours before slicing.

Step 15

The remaining leaven is your new starter. Continue to feed it if you plan to bake again soon or hold in an airtight container in the refrigerator for future use. When you want to bake again, begin feeding the starter a few days or a week beforehand until it once again behaves predictably.