Easy Sourdough Discard Sandwich Bread

If you’re reading this then you are probably a fellow sourdough lover! There are so many reasons to love sourdough, however, it isn’t without fault! One downside to using sourdough as your leaven in bread is that it takes WAY more time to make than other bread. I’m talking 12 or so hours to get the starter active and happy, 12 hours for proofing, 1 hour for a second rise, and 40 minutes to an hour for baking— that’s a lot of time! While I find joy in the long process, sometimes you just need a loaf of bread quickly and don’t have the time to deal with the neediness of sourdough.

That’s where this recipe comes in! With this soft, flavorful recipe, you can have a loaf of sourdough bread in as little as 2 to three hours. Sound too good to be true? It’s not! By using regular baker’s yeast as the leaven, you are able to get a quick rise while using up some of your leftover discards! Win-win.

This post will include the recipe and instructions for making sandwich bread with sourdough discard.

Why does this recipe need baker’s yeast?

The reason that sourdough bread typically takes so long to rise is that we are relying on active, wild yeast as the leaven which takes longer than standard yeast because it has to be fed and activated. Standard yeast is typically already active and only needs about 5 minutes or so to be ready for baking by just adding water and maybe a little sugar as well.

Since this recipe uses sourdough discard rather than an active starter, it won’t be able to create the rise needed in the dough, so we must supplement with an alternative leavening ingredient: active dry yeast.

How to use discard in your favorite bread recipe

This will almost certainly be its own post, but I think it is important to quickly cover the versatility of sourdough discard! You can turn any bread (or, honestly, any baked good) into a “discard” recipe by using a very simple formula.

Sourdough starter is essentially half flour and half water, so when adding sourdough discard into an already established recipe, all you will need to do is take out half of the weight of the starter you are adding from the flour and half of the weight from the liquid. Here is an example:

• Let’s say a recipe calls for 500 grams of flour and 250 grams of liquid and you want to add 100g of sourdough starter to the recipe. First, you would divide the desired weight of the starter in half, which is 50 grams. Next, you would need to subtract 50 grams from the flour and 50 grams from the liquids in the recipe. This will leave you with 450 grams of flour and 200 grams of liquid. I hope that makes sense!

How To Make Sourdough Discard Sandwich Bread

Ingredients

• Flour
  • You can use any type of gluten-based flour for this recipe. I personally would recommend either all-purpose or bread flour for this recipe. If you are looking to add some whole grains into the mix, try swapping out 100-150 grams of the flour in this recipe with whole wheat flour. I find that this amount will give your bread the pronounced flavor of whole wheat bread while still retaining the softness you would look for in a classic sandwich loaf.
• Milk
  • I highly, highly recommend using whole milk for this recipe. The high-fat content adds to the softness and subtle texture of the dough. Without it, I find the bread to be a little dry. If you are dairy-free, I would use something like Oatly’s Full-Fat Milk. Whenever I am looking to bake without dairy, this is my go-to.
• Water
  • Only use spring water sourced from the mountains of Switzerland in this recipe. Totally joking — use literally any water it doesn’t matter at all.
• Butter
  • Another must-have! The butter gives the bread a richer flavor and also adds to the soft and chewy crumb! If you are dairy-free, my favorite butter to bake with is country crocks plant butter. I used to use their avocado oil butter all the time, but I seem to only be able to find their olive oil-based butter these days. Regardless, this butter replaces real butter beautifully when baking. Sometimes I even prefer it to the real thing!
• Active Dry Yeast
  • You can use one whole yeast packet for this recipe if you are using packets. If you are using bulk yeast or yeast out of a jar, this will be 2.25 teaspoons.
• Sourdough Discard
  • Use your unfed sourdough starter for this recipe either from the counter or straight from the refrigerator. If you are looking for more info on how to feed the remainder of your starter, check out my recent post about the best way to feed your sourdough starter here.
• Salt
  • Any type of salt will work well here. I personally used pink Himalayan salt in the loaf pictured above. Don’t forget the salt! I speak from experience when I say that an unsalted loaf is a disappointing loaf.
• Sugar/Sweetener of choice
  • You 100% need to add a little sweetener to your loaf to balance out the flavor profile of the bread. TRUST ME! In the past, I’ve used honey, cane sugar, maple syrup, and coconut sugar in my bread and It always turns out just fine. A good rule of thumb is to plan to add 1-2 tablespoons of sugar to any given loaf depending on taste. This amount won’t make your bread sweet by any means, but it will keep your bread from tasting like a saltine cracker. It’s all about balance here people.

Instructions

1. Prep the yeast
   • Add the yeast and warm water (110-120 degrees Fahrenheit) to the bowl of a stand mixer or mixing bowl. Add a pinch or two of sugar to increase the activity of the yeast and mix together with a fork. If you haven’t done this before, I definitely recommend hanging around and watching the yeast “bloom”. I get a kick out of it every time.
   • Once the yeast has expanded and fully proofed, you are ready to make the dough. This will typically take 5 minutes or so.
2. Make the dough
   • Once your yeast has been proofed, add milk, the rest of the sugar, butter, and starter. Mix until barely combined (the butter will be clumpy).
   • Next, add roughly half of your dry ingredients and mix on low speed with your stand mixer (or by hand).
   • Slowly add in the remainder of the flour. Add half of it at first and then add the rest gradually as you might not need all of it.
   • You’ll know the dough has enough flour when it forms a ball in the mixer and the sides of the bowl are clean. It will still feel sticky to the touch though— this is normal. Don’t add too much flour!
3. Knead the dough
   • The dough will be fairly sticky at first, so add it to a lightly floured surface and start to knead it. It usually takes about 10 minutes for me to feel that it has been kneaded enough. A good way to test if the gluten has developed enough is by doing the windowpane test.
   • This is essentially just taking some of the dough and stretching it with your fingers until it is thin enough that you can see the shadows of your fingers through it when it is held up to a light. If it breaks, in the process, you should knead it more. When in doubt, knead a little more. Don’t worry about over-kneading!
4. Rest
   • Let the dough rest for 30 minutes or so in the bowl you used to mix it. This will allow the gluten to develop so that we can easily shape it into a loaf. It will likely double in size in this amount of time depending on the temperature in your home.
5. Shape and let rise
   • After the dough has rested, remove it from the bowl and back onto the surface you used to knead it. Flatten the dough out into a rectangle (the shortest side should be roughly 9 inches or the length of your loaf pan) and then roll it into a log.
   • Pinch the seams and place the dough in a buttered loaf pan. Cover with cling wrap and allow to rise until doubled in size or when the top of the log is well above the edge of the loaf pan.
   • This is really important if you care about the appearance of your loaf. Spraying the top of your dough with water prior to baking will create steam in the oven which will keep the top of your bread from setting too quickly. When the crust sets prematurely, it can cause the sides of the bread to split which isn’t super appealing to the eye but doesn’t affect the taste or experience in any way. Totally optional, but recommended for sure!
6. Bake at 350 for 40 mins
   • Bake the bread at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 40 minutes or 375 for 25 minutes until the bread is golden brown and the bottom of the loaf is firm to the touch and slightly golden.
   • Allow the bread to cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then transfer it to a cooling rack. Allow it to cool fully before cutting for the best results!
7. Notes
   • Breads that contain sourdough have a tendency to split on the sides while baking. To avoid this, try scoring the top of the dough with a sharp knife or razor to create a more uniform split. 
   • This bread lasts at room temperature for 5-7 days. 

Quick Sourdough Discard Sandwich Bread

Soft, buttery, and delicious! A quick and easy way to use up your sourdough discard.

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 40 minutes mins

Resting Time 1 hour hr 30 minutes mins

Total Time 2 hours hrs 20 minutes mins

Course Main Course

Cuisine American

Servings 12 Slices

Equipment

• 1 Stand Mixer optional
• 1 Kitchen Scale
• 1 Loaf Pan Roughly 9x4
• 1 Cling wrap
• 1 Spray bottle

Ingredients

  

• ½ Cup Water 125g
• 1 Packet Active Dry Yeast 2.25 tsp
• ½ Cup Whole Milk 125g
• 4 tablespoon Unsalted Butter - Softend 56g
• 4 teaspoon Sweetener of choice 20g
• ⅓ Cup Unfed Sourdough Discard 100g
• 3 ½ Cup + 2 Tbsp All-Purpose Flour 450g
• 1 ½ teaspoon Salt 10g

Instructions

 

Prep the yeast

• Add the yeast and warm water (110-120 degrees Fahrenheit) to the bowl of a stand mixer or mixing bowl. Add a pinch or two of sugar to increase the activity of the yeast and mix together with a fork. If you haven’t done this before, I definitely recommend hanging around and watching the yeast “bloom”. I get a kick out of it every time.
• Once the yeast has expanded and fully proofed, you are ready to make the dough. This will typically take 5 mins or so.
• Once your yeast has been proofed, add milk, the rest of the sugar, butter, and starter. Mix until barely combined (the butter will be clumpy).

Make the dough

• Once your yeast has been proofed, add milk, the rest of the sugar, butter, and starter. Mix until barely combined (the butter will be clumpy)
• Next, add roughly half of your dry ingredients and mix on low speed with your stand mixer (or by hand).
• Slowly add in the remainder of the flour. Add half of it at first and then add the rest gradually as you might not need all of it.
• You’ll know the dough has enough flour when it forms a ball in the mixer and the sides of the bowl are clean. It will still feel sticky to the touch though— this is normal. Don’t add too much flour!

Knead the dough

• The dough will be fairly sticky at first, so add it to a lightly floured surface and start to knead it. It usually takes about 10 minutes for me to feel that it has been kneaded enough. A good way to test if the gluten has developed enough is by doing the windowpane test.
• This is essentially just taking some of the dough and stretching it with your fingers until it is thin enough that you could see the shadows of your fingers through it when it is held up to a light. If it breaks, in the process, you should knead it more. When in doubt, knead a little more. Don’t worry about over-kneading!

Rest

• Let the dough rest for 30 minutes or so in the bowl you used to mix it. This will allow the gluten to develop so that we can easily shape it into a loaf. It will likely double in size in this amount of time depending on the temperature in your home.

Shape and let rise

• After the dough has rested, remove it from the bowl and back onto the surface you used to knead it. Flatten the dough out into a rectangle (the shortest side should be roughly 9 inches or the length of your loaf pan) and then roll it into a log.
• Pinch the seams and place the dough in a buttered loaf pan. Cover with cling wrap and allow to rise until doubled in size or when the top of the log is well above the edge of the loaf pan.

Bake at 350 for 40 mins

• Bake the bread at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 40 minutes or 375 for 25 minutes until the bread is golden brown and the bottom of the loaf is firm to the touch and slightly golden.
• Allow the bread to cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then transfer it to a cooling rack. Allow it to cool fully before cutting for the best results!

Notes

Breads that contain sourdough have a tendency to split on the sides while baking. To avoid this, try scoring the top of the dough with a sharp knife or razor to create a more uniform split. 

This bread lasts at room temperature for 5-7 days.