How to Get A Thinner Crust on Sourdough Bread And Make It Softer & Less Chewy (2024)

FAQs

How to Get A Thinner Crust on Sourdough Bread And Make It Softer & Less Chewy? ›

If you aren't quite ready to try a higher hydration dough, you can also try to increase the amount of steam inside your Dutch Oven. Spraying your dough liberally with a water atomiser helps to thin out your crust. It can also help you to get a beautiful blistered sourdough crust!

A thin sourdough crust can be achieved with a higher hydration dough. Lower hydration will generally give you a thicker, tougher crust. Increasing the hydration to at least 70% and up to 80% should give you a thinner, crispier crust on your sourdough bread.

It might be cold dough. One of the most common mistakes is having a dough temperature that's too low for the starter to feed on all the flour in the dough, resulting in a crumb that's dense, with fewer openings.

Splash some water over the top of your bread, just enough to become slightly damp. Place the loaf in a 250°F oven for 5 to 10 minutes. Watch it closely and remove it when warm. Too long in the oven and you'll get dried-out toast.

The flour you used may have contained too much protein. Protein is one of the ingredients that help yeast bread brown. Use bread flour that is purchased at a grocery store or a national brand of all-purpose flour.

Try less water with your flour. Uneven heat in your oven can be the culprit – if you loaf is nicely golden on the outside but gummy or moist in the inside, it's baking too quickly on the outside. Trying reducing the temperature you're baking at and bake for a bit longer.

Avoid Using Too Much Flour On Your Dough Surface

Excess flour can cause a thick, tough crust. If you are using rice flour in particular, this can cause a tougher crust to form. Try to minimise the amount of rice flour you use and brush off the excess before baking.

Sourdough bread can be really light if you know how to play with your ratios. When I want a really fluffy, light loaf with a thin crust I work 300g starter to each kilogram of flour and 500g water (less or more depending on the kind of bread I'm making). A teaspoon of sugar helps.

Most likely when this happens, it's not you - it's your starter. If your loaf is dense, has uneven holes and a gummy texture, most likely there wasn't enough active wild yeast in your starter to make the bread develop and rise during baking. This can be the case even if your starter seems really happy and bubbly.

I like to use a touch of raw honey in my sandwich breads because it adds moisture and helps the natural yeast to ferment. Although, another good option for loaves like this one is molasses. It helps keep the bread moist and adds an extra boost of flavor. I recommend unsulphered molasses and not blackstrap.

How to soften the crust of bread? ›

But one really simple thing you can do is just put the loaf into a plastic bag after it has finished cooling down. So maybe 2-3 hours after it comes out of the oven, just put the loaf into a plastic bag and leave it in there. The crust will soften due to the internal moisture content.

There are two main acids produced in a sourdough culture: lactic acid and acetic acid. Acetic acid, or vinegar, is the acid that gives sourdough much of its tang. Giving acetic acid-producing organisms optimal conditions to thrive and multiply will produce a more tangy finished product.

Over-kneading has a tendency to result in chewy bread. Here's how to tell if you've kneaded enough. Another possibility—you used bread flour when all-purpose flour would do. If a recipe with bread flour turned out chewier than you like, try it with all-purpose and knead only as much as the recipe directs.

Oven Off Method For Crusty Sourdough

The easiest solution to stop sourdough crust going soft after its cooled is to make sure you bake it long enough. When checking if your sourdough is cooked, if the crust feels a little thin or you can still push down and feel give, return it to the oven for longer.

The dough either, wasn't kneaded enough and thoroughly. Or you didn't allow your dough to rise enough. (A) If your bread is very dense, it could be that: (1) your yeast is no good. Buy fresh yeast; (2) you didn't let the dough rise sufficiently before baking.

Sourdough bread can be really light if you know how to play with your ratios. When I want a really fluffy, light loaf with a thin crust I work 300g starter to each kilogram of flour and 500g water (less or more depending on the kind of bread I'm making). A teaspoon of sugar helps.

This thin liquid (called “hooch”) is merely alcohol and water generated by your starter's wild yeast as it feeds. Hooch is a visible cry for help: Your starter is hungry. Once you get it back on a regular regimen of care, it should recover just fine.