Fresh Milled Flour Sourdough Bread

A same-day sourdough bread made with 100% fresh milled flour and no commercial yeast

Prep Time 5

Cook Time 1

Servings boules

850 g hard white wheat flour, freshly milled
150 g hard red wheat flour, freshly milled (You can use all hard white wheat for this recipe and eliminate the hard red. You can also experiment with other types of grain. This is the combination that has yielded the best results for me in terms of taste and texture.)
850 g water
20 g sea salt
300 g active sourdough starter (It’s best if your starter was recently fed, within the last 12 hours, and has been sitting at room temperature. If your starter has been refrigerated for some time and is not active and bubbly, you’ll need to make a levain the night before, using 100g unfed starter, 100g flour and 100g water)

Combine the flour and water in a large mixing bowl. Mix by hand or with a danish whisk until there is no more free flour left. Let rest covered for 30 minutes to 1 hour. (This is the autolyse.)
Add the active sourdough starter and sea salt and gently knead the dough by hand until fully incorporated.
Let it rest, covered, until the dough rises about 20 to 30%. This is important! Fresh milled flour LOVES sourdough and will ferment much faster than white flour. Unlike with traditional sourdough, you don’t need it to double in size. If desired, you can perform stretch and folds once an hour during this time. The bulk fermentation usually takes about 3 to 5 hours total. Keep a close eye on it! If it rises too much, it’ll overproof and be difficult to shape.
Preheat 2 dutch ovens at 480 degrees for 1 hour.
While the oven preheats, shape dough into 2 loaves with a 15-minute bench rest between shaping until each loaf holds its shape well.
Place each loaf on a sheet of parchment paper. Score each loaf with a sharp knife, razor blade or bread lame and spritz with a generous amount of water. Lift the parchment paper with the loaves on top and gently place them into the Dutch ovens.
Bake covered for 30 minutes. Decrease oven temperature to 450 and bake uncovered for 25 more minutes or until the internal temperature reaches 210 degrees F.

This is a high hydration dough (around 80%). I’ve found that higher hydration works better for achieving a fresh-milled flour sourdough loaf with a more open crumb and texture.
Still, don’t expect your typical airy texture and wide open crumb when baking with fresh milled flour! It’s not like white flour. Your loaves will be more dense, but the flavor is out of this world, and the nutritional benefits make it an no-brainer.
I’ve had the best results, when gently kneading my dough after adding the starter and salt - just enough to fully incorporate those ingredients - and then leaving it alone. You can do gentle stretch and folds once an hour, but I honestly recommend a more hands-off approach. The gluten will develop and you’ll get a good rise if you just let the dough rest and do its thing.
You can cut this recipe in half if you just want to bake one loaf, or you can divide the dough into 4 pieces and bake smaller loaves for soup bowls!

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