---
title: 'YOUR FIRST SOURDOUGH (Sourdough Bread For Complete Beginners)'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=VEtU4Co08yY'
video_id: 'VEtU4Co08yY'
date: 2026-06-29
duration_sec: 847
---

# YOUR FIRST SOURDOUGH (Sourdough Bread For Complete Beginners)

> Source: [YOUR FIRST SOURDOUGH (Sourdough Bread For Complete Beginners)](https://youtube.com/watch?v=VEtU4Co08yY)

## Summary

This video provides a step-by-step guide for complete beginners to make their first loaf of sourdough bread. It breaks down the process into six stages, from building the leaven to baking, and emphasizes the fundamentals to ensure success. The creator also covers necessary tools and offers alternative, low-cost options for those without specialized equipment.

### Key Points

- **Six Stages of Sourdough** [0:45] — The sourdough process is broken into six stages: build (leaven), mix, bulk fermentation (with strength-building folds), shape, proof, and bake.
- **Essential Tools** [1:40] — Tools needed: active sourdough starter, digital scale, sturdy spoon, 12-inch stainless steel bowl, proofing basket (or improvised option), Dutch oven (or pizza stone with steam setup), and a thermometer.
- **Float Test for Leaven** [4:25] — To check if the leaven is ripe, do a float test: scoop a little into warm water; if it floats, it's ready.
- **Bulk Fermentation with Folds** [6:10] — After mixing, bulk ferment the dough for about 3 hours at 77°F, performing two sets of strength-building folds (30 min and 60 min into fermentation). Each set includes four stretches and folds plus rounding.
- **Shaping the Loaf** [8:50] — Shape the dough into a taut ball by stretching and folding from all sides, then tucking in corners. Place seam-side up in a floured proofing basket.
- **Proofing Stage** [9:25] — Proof the shaped loaf on the counter for about 90 minutes, covered with a tea towel. The loaf should be puffy and spring back slowly when poked.
- **Two Baking Methods** [9:57] — Two baking methods: Dutch oven (preheat at 500°F, bake at 485°F for 18 min with lid, then 465°F for 25 min without) or pizza stone with lava rocks and wet towels for steam (same temp and times).
- **Scoring the Loaf** [11:20] — Before baking, score the top to create a weak spot for rising. Use scissors to make 5-6 rustic cuts across the top.

### Conclusion

This beginner-friendly sourdough recipe yields a delicious, crusty loaf with a creamy, chewy crumb and hints of acidity. Success here provides a foundation for refining and mastering sourdough baking.

## Transcript

hey what's up unfortunately i think most
people's first attempts at sourdough
bread
end in failure so in this video my goal
is to show you how to make the simplest
possible loaf of sourdough bread and to
speak to the fundamentals of this
process so that you
can make a crusty rustic loaf of
sourdough bread at home if you don't
have a sourdough starter and you want
one
i made a video a couple weeks ago called
how to make a sourdough starter i will
definitely throw the link down in the
description for that
and if you don't want to sit around for
two to three minutes of sourdough bread
theory up front here
that's the timestamp click ahead if you
want to get right to business okay so
you've captured and cultivated your
sourdough starter and now you've moved
on to the maintenance phase we are
giving that starter fresh water and
fresh flour on a daily basis to keep it
in good shape
for eventually baking bread so to go
from starter to finished loaf we need to
follow six stages
of the sourdough process the first stage
is where we take our starter from this
daily maintenance stage and build it
into 11 for our bread
11 is basically just a custom blend of
sourdough starter
flour and water that you make for an
individual dough
to leaven it think of your leaven as the
engine for your bread
this stage can take anywhere from 6 to
24 hours depending on the ratios or the
temperatures
and we'll call this the build stage in
the second stage we combine the flour
the water and all the lemon that we just
mixed with some additional salt because
bread without salt is gross and we call
this the mix stage that's simple enough
in the third stage we ferment that dough
that we just mixed with wild yeast and
bacteria
from our 11. this produces gas in
acidity we call this step the
bulk fermentation we're also going to be
doing some strength building folds that
are really important to this process
think of adding strength as like a
secret ingredient that doesn't weigh
anything but
it's essential to creating a good loaf
of bread adding strength to a dough is
just as essential as adding salt
without it it doesn't work okay stage
four is the shape stage the bulk
fermentation has given us a nice
gassy blob of dough and now it's our job
to organize that blob into a nice
strong taut loaf of bread that will
properly rise in the oven
and hold itself up during the bake stage
five is the proof stage this is where we
continue that gas
and acid production to grow the size of
the loaf this is a really essential part
of the process and a lot of recipes
either misunderstand this part or leave
it out all together and then finally
stage six the bake stage that's where we
bake the loaf of bread
and that's pretty self-explanatory of
course there's tons of ways that you can
manipulate this process to make better
and better versions of sourdough but
think of this as like the training
wheels version of sourdough bread we've
taken a lot of the water out to make it
so that anybody can handle it we've
really
upped the amount of sourdough starter as
well and we're not gonna be making any
fancy shapes or shooting for like
pornographic
instagram crun crum before we start
mixing though let's talk about the tools
you need to get this thing done
first up you need an active sourdough
starter again check the link in the
description for my video on how to make
one of these things next up is a digital
scale
weight measurements are much more
accurate when it comes to making bread
and as a professional baker 100
of the breads that we made were measured
in grams however i will put the
volumetric measurements for this recipe
in the description for those of you guys
without scales
next you're going to need a sturdy spoon
like this one then
a medium bowl which i highly recommend a
12 inch stainless steel one like this
it's restaurant grade it will last
forever and it's pretty cheap i'm going
to be mixing
and fermenting the dough in this bowl
behind that you need something to proof
the loaves in these are linen lined
bread baskets and they're great but if
you don't have a proofing basket that's
no sweat i'm going to be showing you
another option
and it'll be cheap and something you
probably already have on hand next
you're going to need a way to trap steam
and heat around the loaf during the bake
for me i use a dutch oven most of the
time this one is really worn from
hundreds of loaves being baked in it but
if you don't have a dutch oven or you
don't want to put the wear and tear on
your nice one i will be showing you a
cheaper
lower tech option later in this video
that also works just as well finally
you're gonna need a way to measure
temperature i have a few digital instant
meat thermometers here and one of them
is a laser that's dope okay now to
actually make a loaf of sourdough bread
we're starting with stage one of this
process at 9 pm the night before we want
to make our bread this stage is where we
build our leaven so grab your sourdough
starter in a high sided vessel and into
that measure 100 grams of room
temperature water or in this case
78 degrees fahrenheit or 25 degrees
celsius on top of that 25 grams of our
ripe sourdough starter and then 100
grams of all-purpose flour from there
i'm going to stir everything up to
combine
it should look like thick gloppy pancake
batter
excellent now a lid goes on and we're
going to ferment this on our countertop
overnight 12 hours later this 11 is
fully ripened and it's very full of life
it smells sweet it's slightly acidic and
to make absolutely sure that you have a
ripe leaven
a good trick is to grab some warm water
and scoop a little bit of starter into
it this is called the float test and if
your starter is sitting on top of that
water
you're good to go now i'm going to grab
my mixing bowl and i'm also going to
check the temperature of the water for
this dough 92 degrees fahrenheit or 33
degrees celsius is what i'm looking for
so for stage 2 or the mix stage into
this bowl we're going to measure 310
grams of water 200 grams of that
overnight
leaven that we mixed yesterday and there
should be about 25 grams of that left in
the container by the way we're gonna use
that to perpetuate our starter from here
on out so
set that aside and then behind that 400
grams of all-purpose flour 50 grams of
whole grain
wheat flour and finally 12 grams of salt
i'm gonna grab my sturdy spoon now and
start stirring everything up to combine
real quick i've been asked a lot in the
comments from these bread videos why i
use all-purpose flour instead of bread
flour
the shorter answer is that bread flour
is too strong for me in the us where i
live all-purpose flour is a very hefty
11.7
protein that is plenty to properly
strengthen a european style hearth bread
okay
back to mixing once this dough has come
together to form a shaggy mess
like this we're going to lose the spoon
and switch over to a wet hand now i'm
just gonna jump in with my wet hand and
give this a simple squeeze
to combine i'm pinching and turning and
folding to get all that starter and salt
evenly distributed throughout the dough
after about two to three minutes of this
mixing it's looking pretty good but
as you can see it's still sticky and
shaggy and it's a total mess but it's at
least a well mixed and
properly combined one don't worry about
this it is normal it should look kind of
sticky at this point you're going to see
how we get it from here
to a more bread dough looking thing in a
few minutes from here i'm gonna pop a
lid on this and then throw it into a
warm place to begin stage three or the
bulk fermentation stage in this case the
warm place is my oven with the light
turned on and i'm gonna come back in 30
minutes
after that 30 minutes you can see that
there's not much action going on in this
dough and that's totally fine
we're going to give this dough the first
of two strength building folds to do
that i'm going to grab a big
old grip of dough from the side i'm
going to stretch it out as far as it
will let me go and i'm going to fold it
over to the opposite side i'm gonna
repeat this move three more times one
fold for each side
as a reminder we're doing these folds to
layer the gluten network and replicate
the mechanical work that happens in a
stand mixer once we got four folds done
now we're gonna fold up the corners
maybe do that three or four times and
from there we're gonna finish this up by
gripping
folding and rounding this dough into a
nice taut
little ball i'm grabbing the bottom
folding the dough in half and then
tucking it up
under itself to stretch the top out and
that looks good now the lid goes back on
we throw it back in the oven or a warm
place and we check
back in 30 minutes okay here we go 30
minutes later or
60 minutes total into this bulk
fermentation now it's time for set
two of folds this is going to be an
exact repeat of what we just did
that's four folds on top followed by
some corner folding
then a slap and fold rounding thing to
get things into a nice
taut ball i'm also going to check the
dough temperature here as you can see
mine's rolling at 77 degrees and i just
want to mention dough temperature is one
of the main ingredients in good
sourdough bread if yours is running
significantly colder than this you might
want to pop your oven on for a second to
get a little heat in the box
that's what i'm doing here pop it off
after maybe two minutes and then
now you've got something that's gonna
raise the dough temperature a few
degrees all right
after two hours or three hours total
since we've mixed our dough bulk
fermentation is complete
as you can see this dough ball is now
buoyant and alive
and it's grown by about 50 to 60 percent
now we're gonna move into stage four
the shaping stage for that we need our
loaf proofing basket that i mentioned
earlier i'm gonna lightly flour that and
be liberal if this is the first time
you're using these baskets the dough can
stick
and stand by if you don't have a
proofing basket i'll get to the other
proofing option in a second
now i'm gonna flour the dough then the
work surface and then i'm going to flip
the
dough out we're going to cut right to
the pov cam so you can see exactly
what the b boy sees okay we've got our
dough ball on the table ready to go i'm
going to grab the bottom with some well
floured fingers and then i'm going to
pull that
and stretch it all the way out i'm going
to fold that up to close to the top of
this dough blob
press it down lightly and i'm going to
brush off excessive flour from here
now i'm going to grab the sides and
stretch those out about 8 to 10 inches
on each side then i'm going to fold the
left over to the right side and then the
right goes over to the left side
tap that down brush off excessive flower
oh i both bumped the camera oops
now grab the top and stretch it out and
fold that back towards the bottom
make sure it's stuck really well from
here to make sure that there's maximum
internal strength we're going to fold in
the corner so in goes the top left
and then cross over from the bottom left
and then the top right
i'm going to tuck in a few more times
wherever the corners are left sticking
out and
there we go we've got a nice tight bull
shaped loaf that's definitely going to
be ready to party in the oven later on
now we're going to scoop this loaf seam
side down into my palm
then i'm going to grab the basket and
plop that thing in there
seam side facing up you guys from there
if you want some additional peace of
mind you can fold back the corners of
the loaf a little bit to get
that last little bit of strength and
tension sealed in now to move into stage
five the proofing stage we're gonna
cover this with a tea towel and let it
rise on the counter for about 90 minutes
and if you're thinking
hey brah what if i don't have a proofing
basket that's no sweat you can
definitely use the stainless steel bowl
we just fermented our bread dough in
just make sure you have some coarse
non-absorbent not very sticky cloth
in there i'm using some flax linen
that's usually an insect barrier in my
garden
any improvised proofing situation will
definitely need to be floured very well
to prevent stickage and once you got
that shaped up we're gonna pop that in
there
loaf seam side up and let it proof just
like we did in the basket okay it's been
about 90 minutes but before we look at
our proof loaves let's look at the two
ways we can actually bake this bread at
home
first is a dutch oven like i mentioned
before and the combination of the lid
and the cast iron give us that perfect
hot steamy air around the loaf and it
allows it to rise and spring the way it
should i'm gonna load this thing into my
oven at 500 degrees or 260 degrees
celsius and preheat it for 30 to 40
minutes
option two is a cheaper more rugged diy
way to party i've got my ratty 20
pizza stone here i've got a cast iron
pan that i filled with about three
dollars worth of landscaping lava rocks
and then i've got a little baking dish
with some wet towels
rolled up in it the rocks and the towels
go under the stone and when we bake i
fill both of those things with boiling
water and we get tons of quick steam
from the rocks and some long slow steam
from the wet towels thanks to the fresh
loaf bread form by the way for the
inspiration for this method
you guys rock okay let's take a look at
this loaf it's been 90 minutes since we
shaped it or roughly four and a half
hours since we started this process
and now we've got a nice puffy boy
that's properly proofed
up a good way to know whether your loaf
is proofed is to actually poke it the
loaf should receive the poke and barely
hold on to it and then
pop right back out and if your loaf
isn't there quite yet don't sweat it
just
give it some more time we really want to
make sure that this thing is fully
proofed
before we bake it now to bake this thing
we're going to grab a little round of
parchment paper that we cut i'm gonna
throw down some semolina flour or
cornmeal to prevent the dough from
sticking to it and i'm gonna flip this
loaf onto that paper
seam side down next we need to create a
weak spot on top of this loaf so it
reaches its full potential in the oven
usually a lamb or a razor blade is used
but i'm assuming most beginner bakers
out there don't have one of those so to
keep this diy i'm gonna use scissors i'm
gonna give the top of this loaf five to
six
rustic chops nothing too organized or
special then i'm gonna scoot it to the
side
and grab my hot dutch oven i'm gonna
lift this parchment and lower the whole
loaf
in put the lid on the dutch oven and i'm
going to throw it back in the oven and
turn the oven down to 485 degrees
and bake the whole thing for 18 minutes
to do this the frugal diy way i'm gonna
flip my loaf out into a pizza peel or
onto the back of a sheet tray with some
semolina flour i'm going to give that
loaf a scissoring then i'm going to
slide it into the oven on the pizza
stone i'm going to cover the glass of my
oven door with a towel so that i don't
break it and then i'm going to pour
boiling water into the preheated lava
rocks and then onto the wet towels
and from there it's just like the dutch
oven we're going to be baking this at
485 degrees fahrenheit
251 celsius for 18 minutes during that
18 minutes the loaves in the oven are
going to spring upwards the cuts we made
are going to provide a weak spot for all
that upward energy to go
without a proper score on top they're
going to explode out the side and we
would have a really ugly under risen
loaf
after 18 minutes of baking i'm gonna
pull out my dutch oven take the lid off
and let's take a look the loaf is fully
risen it's totally ripped through the
cuts that we made
and it looks organic and it's kind of
tough we're gonna load it back into the
oven and finish baking and i'm gonna
turn the oven down to 465 fahrenheit
250 celsius and i'm going to keep baking
for 25 more minutes and
same deal by the way for the pizza stone
slash lava rocks loaf after 18 minutes
we're gonna take
out the steaming agents we're gonna turn
the oven down to 465 and bake for about
25 more minutes
now finally after that 25 minutes we've
got a fully
risen simple easy beautiful loaf of
sourdough bread we're gonna pop it out
of the dutch oven
or off the pizza stone and let that
thing cool for 30 to 40 minutes
let's take a closer look at the crust
it's dark it's blistered
and it's very well set the inside of
this thing is creamy and chewy
and it has just a hint of acidity we did
the whole thing with wild
yeast that we captured and that's pretty
amazing but look this loaf is not going
to win any awards for the most open
chrome or the deepest most nuanced
sourdough flavor
but it is delicious and it's a great
place to start once you have success at
this level there are just
so many ways that you can refine and
build on this process to make a bread
that
is so good and special that you
literally can't go buy anything close to
it
in most parts of the world if you have
any questions about this process please
hit me up in the comments i try to
answer as many
questions as possible that are asked
politely and hey before i get out of
here anybody who's bought me a coffee
over on kofi recently
thank you very much and if you guys like
this video please consider giving it a
like
maybe watch a couple more of my videos
over there as always guys thank you so
much for your time and attention
thank you for sticking around and we'll
see you next time