Easy Sourdough Sandwich Bread with Honey and Oats
Delicious, slightly sweet, and nutty. This Sourdough Sandwich bread has oats and honey and is an amazing flavorful loaf of soft sourdough sandwich bread that will quickly become part of your bread baking repertoire. Homemade bread is so much better than bread from the grocery store!
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How To Make Delicious and Healthy Sourdough Sandwich Bread With Honey and Oats
There is nothing quite like the smell of homemade sourdough bread filling your home. If you’re looking for a healthy and delicious sourdough sandwich bread recipe that’s perfect for sandwiches or as a side with soup or salad, you’ve come to the right place! This is the best sourdough sandwich bread. It’s a soft bread with a soft crust.
In this post, I’ll show you how to make a mouthwatering honey oat sourdough sandwich bread that’s sure to impress your family and friends. This artisanal bread is the perfect combination of sweetness, nuttiness, and tanginess.
What Does Honey and Oats Do For Sourdough Bread?
Adding honey to a sourdough bread reduces the sour flavor. It can also reduce the bulk fermentation time. It will help activate the leaven. Honey has lots of health benefits as well.
Oats are filled with nutrients such as Magnesium, vitamin B1 (thiamine), iron, and zinc. It’s also high in fiber. And they both taste so good!
Benefits of Sourdough Sandwich Bread
Sourdough Sandwich Bread with honey and oats is not only delicious but it is also better for you than any store-bought bread. Some of the benefits of Sourdough bread are: it is easier to digest, it has a lower glycemic index, and it also has more nutrients thanks to the long fermentation process. It’s also free of all the preservatives and you know exactly what is in your bread! The fermentation process breaks down the gluten, making it easier to digest.
Recipe For Sourdough Sandwich Bread
Now that you know the benefits of sourdough sandwich bread with honey and oats, it’s time to try making it at home. Here is a recipe to get you started:
Ingredients you’ll need for this recipe
Tools you will need:
Step by Step Instructions
Step 1: Boil water. Pour into large mixing bowl and add in oats, butter, and honey and let soak for 30 minutes to an hour. Once water has cooled to comfortable to the touch add sourdough starter with a dough whisk stir until everything is combined.
Step 2: Add in the flour and salt. Mix until the dough is a shaggy dough. The flour should all be combined, but the dough is not smooth.
Step 3: Let dough rest for 45 minutes. Then do your first stretch and fold. The bread dough will be sticky the first time you do the stretch and fold, but will become less sticky each time you do the stretch and fold.
Wet hands help the dough not stick to your fingers as much. Stretch and fold with four turns 3 times total. (Stretching and folding is very soothing. Something about having your hands in dough. ha!) Let the dough rest 45 minutes and repeat 2 more times. Each time you do the stretch and fold the dough will become more smooth and stretchy.
Step 4: Cover bowl and place bread dough in a warm place for bulk rise until dough has doubled. Anywhere from 4-8 hours depending on how warm your house is and have happy your sourdough starter is.
Step 5: After the first rise, turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and gently press dough into a rectangle. Fold the dough over itself in thirds and and roll up into shape of a sandwich loaf.
Step 6: Sprinkle top of loaf with some water and roll in some oats. Place the dough in a oiled loaf pan. Cover the loaf pan with tea towel or plastic wrap and let the dough rise for second rise for another 2-3 hours at room temperature, or until it has doubled in size. (If you are short on time, I have done both rise times for a total of 3 hours. It rose beautifully.) You could let the dough rise in the refrigerator overnight instead for a more tangy flavor and bake the next day.
Preheat the oven to 375°F. Once oven is at proper temperature, score the loaf down the middle and bake the bread for about 40-45 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the bread is 195 degrees F.
Let the bread cool in the pan for a few minutes, then remove it from the pan and place it on a wire rack to cool completely before slicing. Enjoy your delicious homemade honey oat sourdough sandwich bread!
How To Stretch and Fold:
First wet your hands. Grab the dough from one side of the bowl and fold over the top of the dough and press into the middle of the dough. Turn the bowl a quarter turn and again grab the dough from the side and fold into the middle of the dough and press. Repeat until all “sides” have been done. Go around the bowl again. On the third stretch and fold, you can take both hands on either side of the ball of dough in the bowl and pull it up from the middle, with the ends hanging down. Let the ends fold under the center you pulled up. Turn the bowl and repeat.
Tips for Making Perfect Sourdough Sandwich Bread:
Make sure your sourdough starter is active and bubbly before using it in the recipe. You can do the float test to see if your starter is ready. Just take a spoonful of sourdough starter and drop it into a cup of water. If it floats, then it’s ready to use. The active starter is our leavening agent in place of yeast. Make sure you water is just warm to help activate the wild yeast in the sourdough starter and to help the dough rise. If your water is too hot, it can kill the starter. Don’t skip the stretch and fold step! Kneading the dough gently with stretching and folding helps develop the gluten, which gives the bread its structure and texture.
Be patient with the rising times. Sourdough can sometimes take at least twice as long as commercial yeast breads to rise.
Can You Do a Long Ferment in the Refrigerator?
Yes, after the bulk fermentation (the first rise) and after you shape into a loaf, you can do the second rise in the refrigerator and let it ferment longer in the fridge. This slows down the rise and gives this Easy Sourdough Sandwich Bread more of a tangy flavor typical of sourdough breads. My kids prefer not to have too much tang. So I do not do an overnight ferment with this loaf.
I hope you enjoy this recipe and find joy in your pursuit of homemaking!
Much love,
Alissa
Easy Sourdough Sandwich Bread with Honey and Oats
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups warm water- 350g
- ¼ cup honey – 60g
- ¼ cup butter – 55g
- ½ cup active sourdough starter – 120g
- 1/2 cup oats – 60g
- 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour -450g
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt – 10g
Instructions
- Boil water. Pour into large mixing bowl and add in oats, butter, and honey and let soak for 30 minutes to an hour. Once water has cooled to comfortable to the touch add sourdough starter with a dough whisk stir until everything is combined.
- Add in the flour and salt. Mix until the dough is a shaggy dough. The flour should all be combined, but the dough is not smooth.
- Let dough rest for 45 minutes. Then do your first stretch and fold. The bread dough will be sticky the first time you do the stretch and fold, but will become less sticky each time you do the stretch and fold. Wet hands help the dough not stick to your fingers as much.
- Stretch and fold with four turns 3 times total. (Stretching and folding is very soothing. Something about having your hands in dough. ha!) Let the dough rest 45 minutes and repeat 2 more times. Each time you do the stretch and fold the dough will become more smooth and stretchy.
- Cover bowl and place bread dough in a warm place for bulk rise until dough has doubled. Anywhere from 3-8 hours depending on how warm your house is and have happy your sourdough starter is.
- After the first rise, turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and gently press dough into a rectangle. Fold the dough over itself in thirds and and roll up into shape of a sandwich loaf.
- Sprinkle top of loaf with some water and roll in some oats. Place the dough seam side down in a oiled loaf pan. Cover the loaf pan with tea towel or plastic wrap and let the dough rise for a second rise for another 2-3 hours at room temperature, or until it has doubled in size. You could let the dough rise in the refrigerator overnight instead for a more tangy flavor and bake the next day.
- Preheat the oven to 375°F. Once oven is at proper temperature, score the loaf down the middle and bake the bread for about 40-45 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the bread is 195 degrees F.
- Let the bread cool in the pan for a few minutes, then remove it from the pan and place it on a cooling rack to cool completely before slicing. Enjoy your delicious homemade honey oat sourdough sandwich bread!
Notes
- Sourdough bread is usually long fermented, often times overnight and then baked the next morning. This allows the starter to break down the gluten even more and make it more easily digested. But sometimes (ok, often) I make my sourdough bread in a much quicker time frame. My family just prefers it that way. So for this recipe I usually only let it rise for around 4-5 hours total after the stretch and folds. So it can be done slow or quicker like I do, if you like!
- I feed my starter the night before and start making this easy sourdough sandwich bread with honey and oats first thing the next morning. I bake it the same day.
- This recipe is for one loaf, but it can be doubled easily. It also can be made into buns!
Did you make this recipe?
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hoping to make this weekend!
Have you ever doubled it? I think I need to have two loaves as one won’t last.
I haven’t doubled this recipe, but I don’t see why that would be a problem. Let me know how it goes!
This bread was so good!! I’ll be adding it to my rotation!
I’m so glad to hear you liked it!
Love it
Hi there, I am wondering if I can use molasses in place of honey for more of a “brown bread”?
What a great idea! I haven’t used molasses in this bread recipe, but now I need to! Should just be a 1:1 substitution for the honey. I’d love to hear how it turns out for you!
I tried substituting molasses for the honey today and it turned out amazing! My husband raved and raved about it. I hope you have similar results!
This bread is so good! I have made it long ferment, and also just in one day. I have also added some whole wheat to it, with good results, as well as switching out the honey for maple syrup when I was out of honey. A great and versatile recipe, that rises beautifully and is so tender and moist. Thank you!
You’re very welcome! I’m so glad to hear that you are enjoying this recipe! Thank you!
Best bread I have made! Soft, tangy, nutty yumm. Do you know the nutritional break down? I have used Pinterest for years, this is my first review.
I’m so glad you like this bread recipe! Thank you for the review! I don’t include nutritional values with my recipes because ingredients values can differ and I can’t really give very accurate values for everyone. There are nutritional calculators that you can list ingredients in any recipe and it can give you an idea of the nutritional values. Here is an easy one to use that will give you a general idea… https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
Wow! My favorite loaf of bread I’ve made! It truly has the perfect flavor and tenderness. It also comes out looking perfect! So happy I found this…it will probably be made weekly in my kitchen. I’m also excited to try using molasses that was talked about in other comments. Thanks for the delicious recipe!
I’m so glad you like it! I’m sure you will love the molasses, too! It’s amazing! Thank you for your comment!!
Hello again 👋 I wanted to give an update…This has become our only sandwich bread in the house since I made it the first time! I have been making it 2 times a week and it turns out perfectly every time!! My husband comments frequently on how delicious it is. It is versatile, in that it’s great for sandwiches and toast. It is a really fun loaf of bread to make… I actually look forward to when it’s time to make another loaf 🍞😃 I was setting out to make a loaf today and realized I’m out of butter. 😬 Have you ever tried using oil?
Thanks for your help and for this amazing recipe! 🙂 -Heather
Hi Heather! I have not used oil before in this recipe, but it should work out fine. Just use a 1:1 ratio for the substitution of oil. Glad you’re still enjoying the recipe!
This sounds delicious! Can it be made with bread flour or strictly all purpose flour?
Yes, you can you bread flour in this recipe. It will give it a slightly tighter crumb and maybe slightly chewier, but equally delicious. Enjoy!
This sounds amazing! I’m going to make this this week but have what’s probably a silly question…when you say stretch and fold four turns for three times total…is this 12 stretch and folds, then wait 45 minutes and do again? My current sandwich bread does four stretch and folds every thirty minutes so I want to make sure I’m not overdoing it. Excited to try this!!
Hi! Yes, I do about that many stretches and folds. Sometimes I lose count and I also go by feel. On the last set of stretches and folds the dough has a lot more structure than the first and maybe second set. So, it might not need as much handling. I hope you enjoy this recipe!
Put my loaf in the fridge overnight. Can I bake straight from fridge or should I let it sit out for a while then bake?
You can bake it right from the fridge.
I’m so glad I came across this recipe. I’ve been a bit discouraged with how some of my sourdough bread has turned out. Sever loaves landed in the garage they were so heavy. I decided to try this recipe and it turned out great. Was light and airy and I was pleased with the taste. This recipe is a keeper for me. Thanks for sharing.
I’m so happy to hear you like it! Thanks for your comment!
I never comment on recipes but I had to on this one. This was the best sandwich loaf I’ve made so far! It was super soft snd moist but strong enough for a sandwich with the right amount of tang. I was a little worried when I put in my proofer to bulk ferment as it was pretty sticky. But it still came out great! I’ll be making this loaf weekly. Thank you!
Thank you for the comment! Very sweet of you!
Excellent!
This was my first sourdough recipe, I wanted a great sandwich bread. I’ve made this recipe every weekend 4 weeks straight! It’s TOO GOOD! Also have tried the molasses sub as well. Very easy to make and will continue to
I love this recipe. I was wondering if you could replace the oats with raisins to make a cinnamon raisin swirl bread. Thank you.
Hi, I’m so glad you like the bread. If I were going to make cinnamon raisin bread, I would keep the oats and just add the raisins and cinnamon when you form the loaf.
This recipe was outstanding!
I love this bread I have altered at somewhat I use 1.5 cups King Arthur’s golden wheat with two cups all purpose flour it comes out delicious every time
Ok so I just made this and I could absolutely cry. It turned out so dang good. Me and my son are healing our gut health and it’s been so long since we’ve had a good sandwich. I mean this bread is just so perfect. It’s soft but has that sourdough chew still. The crust is perfect everything about it is just so perfect. I will forever make this bread. Thank you so much for sharing.
Hi! I made this and it came out amazing! I was wondering what hydration the starter should be? Mine was 100% but maybe it should be lower so the bread has a tighter crumb? I love it for sandwiches as is, but thought of this question to ask you because I’m not sure what hydration makes the best texture for sandwich bread. Thanks!
Hi, I’m so glad you liked this recipe! I would keep your starter at a 100% hydration (feeding it equal parts water and flour.) This recipe produces a bread that is a bit higher hydration for a typical sandwich bread. I wanted a more rustic textured bread when I put this together. If you would like a tighter crumb, you could try adding a bit more flour (maybe 1/4-1/2 cup or 30-60 grams.)
Thank you so much!
Do you use a scale or cups when measuring ingredients?
I use a scale. I’ve included cup measurements in this recipe for those who prefer that method.