During summer we often reach temperatures up to 30 degrees in our kitchen. As sourdough develops way faster at those temperatures one has to adapt the timetable to get decent results.

If you are brand new, you might want to check out the bread basics first.

Temperature does affect the process of making sourdough bread a lot. As temperatures in our kitchen reach up to 30 degrees during summer times, adjusting the timetable is necessary to avoid over fermentation.

I used this rustic sourdough bread recipe though I did reduce the hydration a bit. The best results I got using rye sourdough with 65% hydration. The crumb was very regular, though the loaf did hold its shape and had a decent taste, not comparable with a slower longer fermentation, but still good.

Note: wheat sourdough seemed to over ferment with this shortened timetable though lost too much taste shortening the rest times even further.

Timetable

• 6am: feeding levain
• 9am: autolyze
• 10am: kneading dough
• 12am: shaping
• second fermentation in the fridge (6-18h)

Note: the long second fermentation is required to get a decent tasting loaf. You can let the loaf rest for 30 minutes at room temperature and start baking at 12:30. However, the loaf will taste more like a yeast based bread rather than a sourdough bread.

Tipp

For the bread in the thumbnail I rolled the shaped loaf in freshly cut rosemary. The taste was amazing, though I think a white bread would benefit even more from this type of crust.