White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour, a Basic Recipe

If you are looking to make a beautiful loaf of white artisan sourdough with French flour, this basic recipe is perfect for you! Using high-quality French flour, this recipe will guide you through the process of creating a delicious and artisanal sourdough bread with a crisp crust and a soft, airy crumb.

Take a look at this video that will show you the whole process of making sourdough bread. Although the recipe is for wholewheat flour, the method remains the same.

What is Artisan Sourdough Bread?

The word ‘artisan’ refers to someone who makes their product by hand, using traditional methods. We use ‘artisan’ here to refer to a style of bread making that includes a traditional long fermentation process and produces a loaf that not only taste amazing, but looks incredible too.

Sourdough bread is made using wild yeast present in the flour and water. To make sourdough bread, you first need a sourdough starter. This contains high quantities of wild yeast and will allow your bread to rise. At the end of the long fermentation process, your sourdough bread will have a depth of flavour that yeasted bread does not. It is slightly acidic and has a lot more character than other breads.

Why Use French Flour?

I go into this more in this post, but to resume, French flour has a different flavour profile to American or British flour. It produces incredibly tasty loaves and has a beautiful colour too. There is also no additives to French flour, only wheat is present in the ingredient list.

However, French flour contains significantly less protein than American or British flour. This means that the recipe has to be slightly different. The hydration (the quantity of water in relation to the quantity of flour) has to be significantly reduced because French flour simply cannot handle high hydration.

After much trial and error, I have found what I consider to be the best recipe for making White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour. It has the perfect hydration, which gives a great rise and oven spring to the loaf. This bread scores highly on both taste and looks!

Equipment Need to Make White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour

• A large, heavy bowl
• A bench scraper
• 1 banneton (oval 25cm x 18cm or round 25cm diameter)
• A baking tray
• A shallow saucepan
• A baker’s lame

Ingredients Needed to Make White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour

• 120g active and bubble sourdough starter
• 500g T65 white flour
• 320g warm water
• 10g salt

Sourdough Starter

Having and active starter is an essential step to making great sourdough bread. In order to ensure that my starter is strong, I like to feed it the night before at a 1:3:3 ratio.

For example, if I am making one loaf of bread the next day, I will need 120g of starter. So, I put 20g starter in a jar and add 60g flour and 60g water. I mix it well and leave it to rise overnight. This gives me the amount of starter I need to make the bread and 20g left over which I put in the fridge to use to feed for my next loaf.

If you don’t have a sourdough starter yet, check out this article which explains how it is done.

T65 White Flour

When choosing your flour to make sourdough bread it is important, in my opinion, to buy organic. This ensures a higher quality flour.

I also check the protein content. The flour I use has a relatively high protein content for France, 13%. Other flours tend to be lower, more like 11% or 12%. If you cannot get hold of flour with a protein content of 13%, you may need to reduce the water content further, to 310g or even 300g.

Much of sourdough bread making is trial and error, so don’t get discouraged! You need to learn to work with the variables in your own kitchen and with the products you have available. I have never made bread that is completely inedible. When it doesn’t turn out well, I use it for toast, french toast, bread crumbs, croutons. It is never wasted and I always learn something!

Water

Up until today, I have always used tap water. However, I have recently had a bad experience… All of a sudden, my starter stopped rising when fed with tap water. After trying to solve the problem several different ways, I came to the conclusion that there must have been an increase in the chlorine levels in the tap water. I intend to buy a water filtre soon, but in the meantime, I leave tap water in a jug (lightly covered) for several hours before using it to make bread, and this lets the chlorine evaporate away. As soon as I started doing this, my starter doubled again. Whew !

As for the temperature, the water should be warm but not hot. In the summer, it is a good idea to use colder water to slow down the fermentation process which will give the gluten time to develop. At the moment, in September, I am using water at room temperature. In the winter, I will probably warm it slightly.

Salt

Making any kind of bread calls for a significant amount of salt. That amount is totally necessary in order for the full flavour of the bread to be brought out. However, I think it is important to use good quality salt wherever possible. I have started using sea salt and I appreciate the extra minerals that brings to the bread as well as the flavour.

White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour: Method

Check out my recent YouTube video for a step by step guide to my sourdough method. Although the recipe calls for wholewheat flour and not white flour, the method remains the same.

The night before

Feed your starter: 20g starter, 60g flour, 60g water. Leave in a warm place to double overnight.

The next morning

Mix

In a large, heavy bowl, mix together your active and bubbly starter, water, flour and salt until all the water has been absorbed by the flour. This should form a shaggy dough. Cover and leave to rest for 30 mins – 1 hr.

Stretch and Fold

Perform a set of stretch and folds. See the above video for what stretch and folds are. Basically, you pull part of the dough up and place it in the middle of the bowl.

I like doing stretch and folds at this point because the dough is usually too sticky to do any other kind of folding. Cover and leave to rest for 30 mins – 1 hr.

Lamination

Traditionally, lamination is used to add extra ingredients such as nuts or fruit. However, I like to do it even when I am not using add-ins because I find that it really helps to strengthen the dough.

Place the dough on a clean, damp surface. Pull it out into a rectangle. Fold it by thirds into a roll and place back into the bowl. Leave to rest for 30 mins – 1 hr.

The above video will also show you how to laminate dough.

Coil Folds

I do three sets of coil folds, or sometimes only 2 if I have been leaving my dough to rest for 1 hr in between folding.

To do a coil fold, pull the dough up in the middle and fold it over itself. Turn the bowl 180 ° and repeat. Turn the bowl 90° and repeat and then again 180° and repeat.

My video will show the process.

You should end up with a nice coil of dough in the middle of your bowl and you will notice that your dough will change over the course of the three coil folds. It will come away from the side of the bowl a lot easier and keep its shape better. This means that the gluten is developing and the dough is getting stronger.

Cover and leave to rest for 30 mins – 1 hour in between coil folds.

Bulk fermentation

Now, you will leave your dough to ferment. I can’t give you a set time as this depends on many variables: temperature, humidity, how long you waited in between folds. You need to wait until the dough has increased by 2/3. The dough will be full of bubbles and will come away from the side of the bowl with no problem when you tip it out.

Be careful not to over ferment your dough as this will lead to bread that will not rise in the oven.

Again, this will take trial and error until you learn what properly fermented dough looks and feels like. Don’t be discouraged if you don’t get it right the first time, keep trying and you will keep improving, I promise. And, as I said earlier, it is very rare for the bread to be inedible. Sourdough bread still tastes good even when it doesn’t look amazing!

Shaping

When your dough is properly fermented, tip it out onto a clean, damp surface. Pull the edges of the dough to the middle to create a ball. Turn the ball over and move around the surface to create tension.

Round banneton: put the dough smooth side down in a lined and lightly floured banneton.

Oval banneton: fold the ball in half and put the dough smooth side down in a lined and lightly floured banneton.

If you wish, you can stich your dough to create further tension.

Again, my video will show you the whole process.

Cold fermentation

Place your banneton of dough in the fridge and leave for 8 hrs or overnight.

The following morning

Preheat your oven to 240°C with a shallow saucepan in the bottom. Boil a kettle full of water.

When the oven is hot, turn your dough out onto a baking sheet. If desired, you can dust with more flour. Score your dough, decoratively if you wish, but at least one deep score, off centre and at an angle. This will enable the steam to escape and the bread to keep its shape.

Turn the oven down to 230°C. Fill the saucepan in the oven with boiling water and bake the bread for 20 mins. It is important to use steam to bake bread as it helps it to rise. Don’t leave the steam out!

After 20 mins, remove the saucepan of boiling water and continue baking for 10 more minutes.

Remove the bread from the oven and allow to cool for at least 45 minutes before cutting into it.

Serve fresh with soup, salad, as a sandwich… Or toasted with salted butter and jam. Or anyway you like actually 🙂 Sourdough bread is delicious so many different ways!

Frequent Problems with White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour

My loaf is flat once baked

This is either an issue with your sourdough starter not being active or strong enough or with over fermentation. Try feeding your sourdough starter at a ratio such as 1:5:5 (20g starter, 100g flour, 100g water for example) to see if that helps.

Also, make sure that you are not over fermenting your dough. This can be a problem especially in the summer when the heat makes the dough ferment faster. Try using cold water and check on your dough regularly to make sure that it does not over ferment.

My loaf has big holes in it

This is probably due to under fermentation. Make sure your dough is well risen, about 2/3, before shaping and that should solve the problem.

My dough is too runny and sticky to handle

This may mean that your flour does not have a high enough protein content to cope with the amount of water used. Try decreasing the water by 10g and see if that helps.

You should be aware that sourdough is very sticky but it gets less sticky during the folding process. Using wet hands should help you handle it better.

The crust on my loaf is cracked

This could be because you did not score your loaf deeply enough. If the steam cannot escape through the score you made, it will escape through the crust and create cracks.

It could also be because of under fermentation, so make sure your dough is well fermented before shaping.

Do you have any other questions or issues? Let me know in the comments. If I have the answer I will be sure to share with you!

What Other Kinds of French Flour can I Use to Make Sourdough Bread?

I have a recipe here for sourdough bread using T110 flour (whole wheat). I also have this recipe for Multigrain Sourdough which also uses T110 flour.

There are two other kinds of French flours that would be good for making sourdough: T80 which is lighter than whole wheat, and T150 which is a darker whole wheat than T110. There will be recipes coming for both of those soon!

Let me know in the comments which kind of French flour you like to use, I love to hear from you 🙂

Why I love making White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour

Sourdough bread is so rewarding. It takes time and effort, and a steep learning curve, before getting the perfect loaf, but when you pull that loaf out of the oven…. Well, there’s no feeling like it!

I love making nutritious, wholesome, delicious food for my family and this White Artisan Sourdough with French Flour is the perfect example. So, why don’t you join me and give sourdough a try today? I promise, you won’t regret it!

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Looking for more sourdough inspiration? Click here!

Do you need a gluten free bread recipe? I have just the one for you here!