Soft Sourdough Sandwich Bread
on Apr 18, 2020, Updated Jun 27, 2024
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Want to bake Soft Sourdough Sandwich Bread that’s perfect to pile your favorite sammy fillings into? This fluffy bread is easier to bite into than crusty sourdough and is unbelievably delicious.
This simple soft sourdough bread recipe makes chewy, tender bread with that tart flavor you love in sourdough; it makes the best sandwiches like this Homemade Club Sandwiches and pesto grilled cheese!
If you’ve been searching for a more kid friendly recipe for sourdough bread, look no further! My soft sandwich loaf sourdough bread is ideal for all the ham-and-cheese’s and PB&J’s your heart desires. Listen, I love a good ol’ crusty, crunchy-on-the-outside slice of sourdough, and that sort of bread certainly has its place in my heart (and on my plate). But for sandwiches? I’d go with this rendition all day. You want something soft and cushiony to bite into when making a sandwich, not crusty.
Table of Contents:
Table of Contents
Ingredients:
- Sourdough starter: Have you made bread using a sourdough starter before? It’s so easy! It just takes a few days to prep your starter, so if you want to make your own, plan accordingly. Here’s a post all about making your own sourdough starter.
- Water: The water thins the sourdough starter before adding the rest of your thick ingredients.
- Sugar: Using a little bit of sugar adds a touch of sweetness to balance the tart from the sourdough flavor.
- Light oil: Oil is what makes the bread really soft and tender.
- All-purpose flour: Flour is the essential ingredient in making bread! I like all-purpose because it’s versatile and makes a nice chewy, soft-textured bread.
- Salt: Salt adds balanced flavor to the rest of the ingredients.
See recipe card below for full information on ingredients and quantities
Frequently Asked Questions:
If the dough doesn’t rise, it may be because the room is too cool. Try moving the bowl into a warmer spot in the room to activate the natural yeast. This is the most common issue I see with sluggish bread and starters!
Using a light flour helps sourdough bread to be lighter. I like using all-purpose white flour. You can also sift your flour to make it extra light. This recipe yields a softer and fluffy bread thanks to the oil used in the ingredients, too.
Store soft sourdough loaf bread in an airtight Ziploc bag for up to 5 days.
The best way to keep your bread from drying out is storing it in an airtight bag, and not slicing it until you are ready to serve it. Slicing ahead of time lets air touch more of the bread, which can make it drier and more crumbly.
Homemade sourdough sandwich bread keeps for up to 5 days in the fridge. You can also freeze an entire loaf for up to 4 months. Just thaw in the fridge overnight before you want to serve it!
More Sourdough Recipes to Consider:
Sourdough Recipes
Chocolate Chip Sourdough Bread
From Scratch Recipes
Overnight Sourdough Muffins
Sourdough Recipes
Sourdough Banana Bread
Chocolate Chip Cookies
Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies
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Soft Sandwich Loaf Sourdough Bread
Ingredients
- 75 grams active sourdough starter, (very full 1/3 cup)
- 300 grams water, (1 1/4 cup)
- 15 grams sugar, (1 tablespoon)
- 15 grams light oil, (1 tablespoon)
- 500 grams all-purpose flour, (4 cups)
- 10 grams salt, (1 1/2 teaspoons)
Instructions
- Feed your starter 12 or so hours before you plan to make the dough. The timing should be such that you are using your starter at it’s peak, so feed it so that it’s peaked when you want to make the dough, it’ll vary based on your starter and house temperature.
- When you starter is fed and has grown in size, make the dough while the starter is still tall and full, at its peak.
- To make the dough, measure out your starter into a medium to medium-large mixing bowl.
- Add the water, and whisk the starter and the water together until well combined.
- Add the sugar, oil, flour, and salt to the bowl.
- Use a fork to combine well; it’ll be a little stiff but just mix it up well.
- Cover the bowl with a damp clean kitchen towel, and let it rest for 1 hour.
- After an hour, come back to the bowl, and gently pull the edge of the dough in the bowl and push it into the middle. Work your way around the bowl, pushing the dough to the center each time. Do this a few times until the dough comes together in a ball. It will look more like traditional bread dough at this point.
- Cover the bowl again with a damp kitchen towel, and let the dough rest at room temperature for 8 to 12 hours, depending on your schedule.
- Prepare a loaf pan by spraying it with cooking spray or greasing well with butter.
- Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Don’t punch it down or be too rough with it — it’s worked for hours to rise — no need to deflate it on purpose.
- Roll the dough into a long log and tuck in the ends. Use your hands to gently press the loaf into an even shape, pressing along the bottom of the loaf near the work surface.
- Place the loaf into the pan, smooth side up. I like to use an 8×3 inch loaf pan for this recipe, slightly smaller than a 9×5 loaf pan as it helps the top dome up more.
- Cover with a damp towel, and allow to rise for 1 to 2 hours or until it has risen a 1/2 inch or so above the rim of the pan. How quickly it rises will depend a lot on the temperature of your house.
- While the bread is rising, preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
- When the dough is ready, bake it for 40 to 45 minutes. The loaf will be a deep brown color.
- Let the loaf rest 5 minutes in the pan, and then remove it and let it cool on a wire rack. Let the loaf cool at least an hour before cutting.
- Store in a plastic bag for 3 to 5 days. It will cut best once it has cooled completely.
Notes
- I love this easy loaf so much. It’s our favorite sandwich bread and it makes great toast.
- New to sourdough? You can learn how to make a starter here.
I’m halfway through the rising of your sourdough bread and then discovered your recipe for this sandwich bread. Can I add the additional ingredients for the sandwich loaf now and continue to let it rise and proceed to make sandwich loaf? Will a Pullman pan work for this? Thank you!
You can just use the dough as you have it for a sandwich loaf! And I haven’t tried it with a pullman but I’d love to know if you do!
May I ask what size loaf pan you use for this recipe? I have the standard size but I also recently purchased a couple vintage ecko 607 loaf pans that are 10″x5″x4″. Thank you.
Mine are 8×4 and I’ve made a flatter loaf in an 9×5!
Hi! Do you have a sourdough bread recipe with wholewheat and white bread flour?
I do in my sourdough cookbook!
Hi! Just wondering if I can substitute some of the flour for white whole wheat and if so what percentage of the total flour. I plan to use bread flour for the other portion. Also, how long to proof if I’m using a warming device (such as instant dutch oven that I can program to be at 77° F). I keep hearing that temperature dictates time, but I’m not sure what I’m looking for with regard to when it’s ready. Thank you!!
I’d make it a few times to get a feel for it before switching up the flours and the times mentioned should be similia when using a warming device!
Since finding this recipe, I haven’t bought bread from the store in months. We love it! I do slice after completely cool as thin as I can, then carefully restack the slices into the loaf and place in a large ziplock bag and push out all excess air before sealing. Then I store it in the fridge. I find that it lasts us a week! (If we haven’t eaten it all before that time is up.)
After trying your regular sourdough recipe over and over with great success I wanted to try the sourdough loaf. The flavor is fantastic, but found it a little dense. Any advice for softer less dense inside?
Thanks
Just let it rise longer in the pan! That’ll fix that right up, wait until it’s even with the top of the pan or just over, it could take several hours in a winter kitchen.
So easy and so delicious! I love being able to whip up the dough for an overnight rise, and then it’s pretty much ready to bake in the morning with only a few bits of kneading and shaping. Saves me so much time and I still get delicious homemade bread at the end! Thank you!
I have made this recipe a couple times and your regular sourdough recipe numerous times. I love both. I do have a question. I make my dough when my starter is at at it’s hughesthighest highest. Something that means I will be baking at 1 in the morning! Can I let it sit in the fridge overnight? Either in the pan or not? Thanks
Sourdough is not that fussy, you can even use starter that hasn’t been fed at all! You for sure can make this fit to your schedule more, it’s really not as fussy as it’s made out to be!
By far the best sourdough sandwich bread. I’ve made this a few times and never fails… Perfect! I’ve done the bare minimum time of letting the dough rest for 8 hours and I’ve done it where it rest more than 12 hours and it’s still perfect.
Sourdough newbie here! I tried making this recipe. And it did not get the rise. I’ve got a young starter… only about a month old. I fed my starter and it had doubled by 8 hours so I started my dough for this bread. Measured and mixed everything using a scale. Let it rest for an hour. Did the fold and thought the dough was feeling good. Let it rest overnight. (8 hours) Formed into loaf but I only had 9 x 5 pan. Let it rest and it didn’t do much. A little but not much. I know its colder here, especially this week. So I let the loaf rest on the stove while the oven was on warm hoping that would give enough heat. I had it resting about 4 hours and it was about 3/4 in to 1 inch from the top of the pan and, since it had been more than double what the recipe said, I thought maybe it wouldn’t get higher because of the bigger pan. So after 4 hours I baked it hoping for good results but it didn’t come above the pan at all!
Any idea where I went wrong? Is my starter just too young? Should I have rested it longer but I’m always afraid of overproofing. I’m not giving up. I want this to work and I see that so many people have had success with this recipe. Any help would be greatly appreciated!!!
It sounds like you are right on track! I think that it’s just cold at your house and that’s the main issue. Does your oven have a bread proofing option? Sourdough is very hard to over proof, so I think next time I would just let it rise longer in the pan until it’s about an inch above the rim. That does it make it more sour in flavor though, something to consider. How was the texture of the small loaf?