Want an easy sourdough baguette recipe? These step by step sourdough baguettes have a classic, crunchy sourdough crust and a light and airy, chewy interior.
Hello sourdough lovers, today I present you with my sourdough baguette recipe.
If you haven’t tried a fresh sourdough baguette before then I’m very glad you’ve made it to this post! They are something special. An abundance of the classic sourdough crust teamed with an airy, light and chewy inner. It’s absolutely delicious.
Making baguettes is not that hard and if you read on you will see. I will start with an outline of my timings and go into more detail later on.
The timings show a ‘range’ of time in which you can complete these steps. They don’t have to be exact, there is flexibility.
Between 7am-9am: Make a levain. This levain can sit between 4-8 hours, depending on when you’re ready to start the next step.
Between 12pm-2pm. Autolyse. Flour and water is mixed and left to autolyse for about an hour, then the levain and salt is added
Between 2pm-6pm. Bulk ferment time. First you will stretch and fold the dough (by method of coil fold) , for two hours, every 15 minutes.
After the last fold the dough will sit for another two hours before pre shaping.
Between 6pm-9pm. Pre Shape. On a well floured bench, split the dough into four and shape and roll into balls.
Leave the balls to sit on the bench for another three hours.
9pm. The dough balls are shaped into baguettes and placed in the refrigerator for a cold proof of at least 8 hours, but up to 20.
The next morning. Baking day.
Levain
Usually when I make my sourdough bread, I feed my main starter freshly every morning and then use some of that to make my bread, leaving some behind to re-feed the next time I bake.
For these breads, I’ll be making a seperate starter (levain) using a little bit of my bulk starter, and then I’ll use that entire thing in the baguettes.
70g of starter added to 70 grams of flour and 70g of water. This is left for 4-8 hours to double. This levain is fed at a ratio of 1:1:1 because I want it to rise quickly. If you need more time, or you want to start your levain the night before, I’d suggest feeding it at a higher ratio of flour and water. 1:2:2 or 1:3:3, this will slow the rise down so your starter doesn’t peak and collapse.
You want 210g starter in total so if you are feeding it at a higher ratio, adjust the amounts accordingly. (eg 1:2:2 would be 42g starter, 84g flour and 84g water.)
Your starter should be used when it has at least doubled and is fluffy and airy, with visible thick yeast strands when it’s scooped from the jar. A starter that has sat too long or in a too warm room will be very acidic and runny and not easy to work with later on.
Autolyse
For the autolyse, the main flour and water is mixed and left to sit. This helps form the gluten strands in the flour, which will make a much more pliable and easy to work with dough.
It’s just mixed into a shaggy dough. The proper working of the dough will happen later, when the stretch and folds start.
If you are comfortable working with wetter doughs, you can add a little extra water. It creates a more open crumb. Wetter dough can be harder to handle but not if you perfect the coil fold (in the video below). The coil fold is made for wet dough.
After the autolyse period (minimum of an hour), add in the levain and salt. Mix it together with wet hands until it is well combined, then put it in a glass, stainless steel or ceramic dish.
Now it is time to start coil folds which help build the structure in the dough. Coil fold are my favourite technique to use for sourdough stretching as it keeps the face of the dough nice and smooth.
Coil folds are when you lift up a part of the dough and fold it on to itself. Here is a video of my second round of coil folds of the baguette dough.
After two hours of coil folding your dough should be smooth and bouncy with the odd bubble forming.
Now leave it to sit for two hours before pre shaping.
Pre-Shaping. Before the actual shaping of the baguettes, they’ll be shaped into balls of dough.
These are left to bulk ferment for another two hours on the bench.
The dough is split into four.
Take one piece and form it into a square. Take each of the four corners of the square, and bring them, one by one into the middle to create a little parcel. Flip this parcel upside down so it’s seam side down and then cup this gently in between your hands and rotate it around and around on the bench to form a ball. Leave the balls on a floured bench, covered with a tea towel, for two hours.
If your kitchen is on the cooler side, anything below 22 degrees Celsius fan (71.8 F), leave the dough balls to sit for 3-4 hours instead of two.
Shaping. Once your dough has sat, you can shape each dough ball into a baguette and place it either in a baguette tray or in-between floured towels. Then they’ll go in the refrigerator for 8-20 hours.
To shape the dough, grab a dough ball and gently form it into a horizontal rectangle. Take the bottom third of the dough and fold it up to meet the middle. Use your palm to push it and down and seal it together. Rotate the dough 180 degrees, and do the same to the top third of the dough. Each time you push it down with your palm you will elongate the dough. Do this again once more on both sides.
Flip the dough so it is seam side down and starting rolling it on the bench to lengthen it, tapering off at the ends to get that traditional baguette tip.
Place them in a well floured baguette tray or if you have no baguette pan, use a floured towel to keep the dough shape.
Please flour whatever you are using very well. Nothing worse than your dough sticking to a towel, or the bread getting backed on the baguette pan and not coming loose!
Then they’re placed in the refrigerator for a long cold proof. I cover mine with a tea towel.
When you are ready to bake the breads, preheat your oven to 230 degrees celsius (446 Fahrenheit), fan-bake, and remove the dough from the refrigerator.
Sprinkle with a little flour and give at least three big angled slashes in the dough to allow the air to escape. How many slashes you do is up to you but if you don’t do enough or they aren’t deep enough, the air will burst out where you might not want it to. I bake them either in the baguette tray, or carefully remove them from the towel and bake on a floured oven tray.
Place a few ice cubes in a tray in the oven alongside the baguettes to create the steam that will set the crust.
Bake the baguettes for 30-35 minutes until they are browned to your liking. Leave them to cool completely before cutting to avoid a gummy crumb.
Then enjoy!
Sourdough Baguette Recipe
Ingredients
Levain
- 70 grams sourdough starter
- 70 grams high-grade flour (minimum 11% protein)
- 70 grams water
Dough
- 900 grams high-grade flour (minimum 11% protein)
- 600 ml water You can increase the water by another 50 – 100ml if you like. It makes a wetter dough but a more open end crumb.
- 2 1/2 tsp salt
Instructions
- Start off by making your levain.In a clean jar, mix the 70g starter, 70g flour and the 70g water and stir well. Leave it to sit for at least 4 hours until it has well-doubled, but not collapsed. *See notes on starter in the post above.
- Once your levain is well underway and at least nearly doubled, you can start the autolyse. Mix the 900g flour and 600g water and use wet hands to bring it together into a rough ball of dough. Leave this to sit for a minimum of an hour.
- After it has sat for at least an hour and the levain has doubled, add the salt and levain to the dough and mix it well together using wet hands.Transfer it to a glass/stainless steel or ceramic tray.
- For two hours, coil fold the dough every 15 minutes. See the video in the blog post on how to do a coil fold.
- After two hours of folding, leave the dough to sit for another two hours.
- Gently tip the dough from the tray onto a lightly floured bench and cut it into 4 even pieces. Take one piece and form it into a square. Take each of the four corners of the square, and bring them, one by one into the middle to create a little parcel. Flip this parcel upside down so it’s seam side down and then cup this gently in between your hands and rotate it around and around on the bench to form a ball. Leave the balls on a floured bench, covered with a tea towel, for two hours.If your kitchen is on the cooler side, leave the dough to sit for 3-4 hours instead of two.
- Once your dough has sat for two hours, you can shape each dough ball into a baguette and place it either in a baguette tray or in-between floured towels. To shape the dough, grab a dough ball and gently form it into a horizontal rectangle. Take the bottom third of the dough and fold it up to meet the middle. Use your palm to push it and down and seal it together. Rotate the dough 180 degrees, and do the same to the top third of the dough. Each time you push it down with your palm you will elongate the dough. Do this again once more on both sides.Flip the dough so it is seam side down and starting rolling it on the bench to lengthen it, tapering off at the ends to get that traditional baguette tip.
- Place the baguettes either in a well floured baguette tray or in-between floured towels. Then they’ll go in the refrigerator for 8-20 hours.
- When you are ready to bake the breads, preheat your oven to 230 degrees celsius (446 Fahrenheit), fan-bake and remove the dough from the refrigerator.Sprinkle with a little flour and give at least three big angled slashes in the dough to allow the air to escape. How many slashes you do is up to you but if you don’t do enough or they aren’t deep enough, the air will burst out where you might not want it to.Place a few ice cubes in a tray in the oven alongside the baguettes to create the steam that will set the crust.
- Bake the baguettes for 30-35 minutes until browned to your liking. Leave them to cool completely before cutting to avoid a gummy crumb.
Have you made these? Tag me and let me know! @home_grown_happinessnz
Thanks for this excellent, easy to follow post. I have successfully made these twice now.
Thanks so much for letting me know Ann! That’s great to hear!
Awesome last 2 days made your sourdough bread it tastes and looks awesome thanks.. now I tought to use same recepie but shape in baguettes then reading your blog I have found baguettes mmmmm… so looks a bit same but I have question … what makes difference refreshing starter 1:1:1 for baguettes and 1:2:2 for bread? I mean what is reason for this ? More sour in bagutte? Or more rising time? To be honest We love sourdough but not too much sour … 😉 thanks a lot
Hey I actually use the 1:1:1 ratio because I want a quick rise with not toomuch sourness! If it’s in a reasonably warm room a starter fed at 1:1:1 can rise very quickly so the acid content in there would be reasonably low.
I’ve written it can take 4-8 hours to account for different temperatures and environments but really it should take 4 hours and no more.
The baguette dough is similar to the sourdough bread yes but if you make I think you’ll see it feels different.
It uses a more immature starter and only half the amount of starter compared to the sourdough loaf, it’s not going to be quite as elastic and bouncy as the sourdough bread dough.
Yeah I find that fan-bake gives a much more consistent bake than a regular oven
Cool but bread I keep baking with regular the result is grat so I guess no need to change that one 😉
Totally, you definitely keep doing what works for you! 😊
Oh i see. Well i bake bread always with fan heat but with with my sourdough bread it’s not as important as the majority of the bake is covered in a Dutch oven or similar. That’s why I didn’t specify it.
Baking without fan heat just doesn’t brown my bread as nicely. That is the main issue, and I like a browned bread for taste reasons.
Oh ok yes I bake in dutch oven also will tey next time with fan bit for color I am putting 1/2 tsp liquid malto it gave nice crust and color to loaf I am baking 30min covered on 230c and then 20min opened also 230… I dont like to hard baked sort like birned but stil I get nice color and I guess because of malto 😉
So I did change your recepie a bit 😂…Malto I am pitting same moment with starter and salt …
I think it’s great you tweaked the recipe to suit you! Sourdough is so dependant on so many variables anyway. It’s best you learn what works best for you, your kitchen and your taste buds. Makes it more fun that way too I think 😁
Ony think that I am trying to figure out why sometimes baked loaf from insode is sort like gom or little bit wet I dont know would like to get more dried from inside bit then if I bake longer it will burn outside or this os just who needs to be with soirdough or maybe moer proofing in fridge needed I keep for 8 hrs .. not sure about this one 😔
A gummy texture can be from a few causes.
An underproofed loaf, you may need to keep it on the bench to bulk proof a little longer before placing in the fridge. Was it bulked out by 50%, does it bounce back when touched with a wet finger?
At the same time it could be overproofed and risen too much and too fast before placing in the fridge. If it’s very hot in your kitchen can be an issue. An overproofed dough will loose its structure and become slack and spread out.
Lastly it can also be that you are cutting it too soon. If the bread hasn’t cooled down properly, the steam trapped inside the loaf can make it gummy when cut.
Third reason scraping because loaf was cutted 12h later do I guess it is cooled enough 😉..
Reason underproof wel this one can be good one well to me was doubled nice and fluffy it was well lees then last one wich I found not as gummy as this one and first one was almost 4hrs propfing on counter before fridge second one 2 hrs so this can be reason… bounce test I did not perform thus should be done after proof till dough is still in glass jar ?😳
Temp at kitchen is about 22-23C
Yeah just give it a little prod with a wet finger while it’s still in the glass jar 😊.
We did tag you on instagram dor recepie of you dont mind 😉
What’s your Instagram name?
Oh I like the bread you tagged me in! It looks great! I do cover mine with a tea towel, I’ll add that in to the blog.
Which ever way you use, dust the bottom of the bread, towel or tray so well so it doesn’t stick. Especially when finally baking it in the oven, it sucks when it sticks to the tray. sometimes after proofing in the fridge overnight the dough can stick on those little holes
Yep thats why i wil use towel I think 😉… probably tomorrow you can see result on instagram if its not disaster heheh
Hi! I want to try your baguette recipe! I was wondering how many baguettes this is I tended to make? Also, I do not have a convection(fan) oven so would I increase the oven temp a little bit? Thanks can’t wait to try!
Hey it makes about 4 depending on how big your roll them. You could increase the temp a bit but the main thing about a convection oven is the fact that they give a more even bake. If your breads are browning unevenly, turn the tray in the last 10 minutes or so to give a more even browning 😊
I made these and I love your detailed instructions! I was wondering g if you wouldn’t mind saying though how long about each baguette should be? I think I made mine to skinny and long??? They are each just over a foot long.
That sounds about right! They’ll puff and fatten when they’re baked 😊