This easy gluten free sourdough bread recipe is made from my sourdough starter recipe and it is so easy to make, you will be surprised it is gluten free! It is a bit of work to make your first gluten free sourdough starter...but it is well worth the effort!
This sourdough bread is also egg-free, dairy-free, and yeast-free so it is perfect for those with food allergies!
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There is nothing better than the taste of fresh sourdough bread! It is seriously (or should I say srsly) is the most incredible comfort food! I have streamlined Sadie's recipe quite a bit since she first shared her recipe with me back in 2014. Sadie used a combination of millet, sorghum, brown, and white rice flours in her original recipe.
Unfortunately, many of us don't have a lot of individual flours on-hand...especially given how hard ingredients have been to find lately.
This is the second installment in my how to make gluten free sourdough bread series. The very first thing you need before making this gluten free sourdough bread is to make your gluten free sourdough starter. This will take you to the tutorial to get started.
This gluten free homemade sourdough bread recipe is yeast-free and absolutely worth the effort. You can enjoy homemade sourdough bread with very few ingredients! Feel free to comment or send me an email if you have questions, or read the comments below for more inspiration.
If you would like to try making a version of Bread Srsly's famous sourdough bread, this is a great introduction to sourdough bread.
If you love gluten free bread as much as we do, check out all of my delicious gluten free bread recipes. We have tested several gluten free flour blends and flours so you have lots of options for making this bread!
One of my readers had great success making this gluten free sourdough with Bob's 1 to 1 Gluten Free Flour Blend, another with Krusteaz, and I am trying it out with King Arthur's Measure for Measure. I have added my photos of every step along the way to make this recipe easier to follow.
Making gluten free sourdough bread takes a lot more time and work to make sourdough bread without yeast. The good news is once you have a starter, it is quick to make this bread.
I encourage you to read Sadie from Bread Srsly's story about how she started her famous gluten free sourdough bread company! Her story is so romantic! Her fams affectionately call it Srsyl Bread :-).
Is sourdough gluten free?
No, regular sourdough is not gluten free because it is made with wheat flour. If you are gluten free, you need to use gluten free flours to make your starter and bread.
First step:
Go to my How to Make a Gluten Free Sourdough Starter page and make your gluten free starter! Do this FIRST!!
Instructions:
We are finally ready to make a loaf of this gluten free sourdough bread! Are you as excited as I am?
You will need ½ cup of your gluten free starter. Make sure it is bubbling and room temperature! I typically take my starter out of the refrigerator the night before I make bread. I feed it by adding some gluten free flour and water, and I let it sit on the counter overnight.
Put the dry sourdough bread dry ingredients into a bowl and whisk together. Add water and the sourdough starter as described in the recipe card below. Mix well.
You want a dough that is wet like pancake batter. Let the dough rise for 12-24 hours at room temperature.
After rising, feed the dough a little more gluten free flour and water, mix, then rise for an hour. (This will give it some extra oomph for additional rising.)
How can you speed up the rise?
If you want to speed your rise a little, you can add 1-2 teaspoons of sugar. Many of my readers have used 1 teaspoon of soda powder mixed in. I added 1 teaspoon of sugar to the GF Jules mix before adding it to the bread loaf tin and it seems to have risen higher, and kept the rise through baking better.
Sourdough tip:
Put aside about ½ cup of the starter from your bowl to be used as your starter for another time. You can store it in the refrigerator and feed it 2-3x a week. You can read so much more about making and feeding a sourdough starter in my How To Make a Gluten Free Starter post.
Grease a non-stick metal 1 lb. loaf pan and coat well using a basting brush. Pour in the dough. Don’t overwork the “batter”. Let it rise 2-12 hours in the pan (go by how big it rises). It may look lumpy. Let it- don’t overwork- for every stroke- you are eliminating the rise.
Note that the King Arthur Measure for Measure is a little runnier in consistency. The GF Jules has a much higher starch content and appears much fluffier consistency!
Baking:
Bake the gluten free sourdough loaf for 45 minutes at 375 degrees F. I noticed it hadn’t browned on top – so I brushed the top with melted butter at the 45-minute mark then quickly closed the oven door quickly.
Hurry when gently brushing the melted butter on- the longer the oven is open and rack pulled out a bit – will lose a tiny bit of its rise. Once the oven is closed again, the rise came quickly back. Bake for the full 60 minutes and then with a Probe style Roasting Thermometer showing 160-180 degrees F in the center.
If you notice that the thermometer has a bit of residue on the probe, you can turn off the oven and leave the loaf in the oven to cool that way so it finishes baking and cooling more gently to keep as much of the final baked in rising and fluff.
Cool completely before removing from pan and slicing with a serrated bread knife.
It was a pleasure at each step- because it was an adventure. Not everyone is that enthusiastic, I know. But, for someone whom has zero experience in gluten free baking – this brave trial was easy and enjoyable." - Dana
A note on gluten free flour blends:
I have tested several different gluten free blends. I talk a lot about King Arthur Measure for Measure, which is a standard blend. I also used a very starch heavy gluten free flour blend by GF Jules. Both performed very well.
The main difference is the texture of the bread. GF Jules was a lot lighter and fluffier while the King Arthur flour blend loaf was a little more hearty like regular sourdough bread. Both baked with a nice crust. I brushed melted butter on both halfway through the baking process so they would brown.
Many of my readers have chimed in with different individual flours they have tried down in the comments so I encourage you to keep reading through everyone's comments. Dana loved Bob's Red Mill 1 to 1 Gluten Free Blend with this recipe.
Can you shape this bread as an oval?
I am testing different ways to do this. Sadie's sourdough recipe was really meant to be loaf style and it is not really "formable" so I am experimenting with ways to make it work and I will report back when I get it right.
I then put the ball of dough into a greased Dutch oven. I covered it with a towel and put it into our sunny kitchen window for another rise.
So the rise experiment in the Dutch oven with a shaped loaf got a little out of control as the rise went crazy. Total fail! I am still going to experiment with this to see how to handle this better and report back to you.
How to get a crusty bread:
I highly recommend baking this bread with a pan of hot water to create a steam. Sadie at Bread Srsly didn't do this, but I found baking with hot steam creates a really good crust to the bread.
To get steam, you can fill a shallow baking dish with very hot water and put it on the bottom rack in your oven when you turn the oven on. Keep it there the first hour your bread bakes.
You can also bake your sourdough in a Dutch oven. Keep the lid on for the first 45 minutes of baking then remove the lid for another 30 minutes.
Reader Lois bakes this sourdough this way to get a chewy crusty crust: "Once it is fully risen I remove it from the oven and heat my oven to 450. I put the loaf in and then decrease the temperature to 420 for 20 mins. This gives a beautiful chewy crust. Then I decrease my oven again to 375-400 F and bake for 30 minutes until the interior loaf measures above 205 F."
Serve with:
If you haven’t eaten a lot of sourdough bread or are looking for some ideas on what to serve it with, here are a few tasty ideas:
- Roasted Chicken - Place pieces of roasted chicken and cheese (if you can tolerate dairy) and toss it under the broiler until it is hot and the cheese is bubbly. Add toppings and enjoy. So good!
- Bread Bowl - Use this sourdough gluten free bread as a base for a bread bowl. Add in your favorite soup and gobble it all up!
- Bread Crumbs - You can dry the loaf of sourdough bread out and turn it into bread crumbs. It will go lovely in any recipe that requires bread crumbs, and the flavor is terrific. Try this delicious Gluten Free Meatloaf recipe!
- Dip - Serve pieces of gluten free sourdough with this Hot Cream Cheese Dip and it will go perfectly! It pairs nicely with anything cheese-based too.
If you love gluten free bread, you will want to try these Gluten Free Cheddar Herb Muffins recipes too. They are so light and fluffy. Also, these Paleo Biscuits are delicious and perfect for anyone who needs to be grain-free!
If you want to try another great sourdough recipe, give this Gluten Free Sourdough Bagels recipe a try! If you want to make incredible gluten free bread quicker, give my delicious Gluten Free Bread Machine Bread recipe a try!
Reader Veronica R had great luck using Krusteaz. "I made mine with Krusteaz Gluten Free 1 to 1 flour and it turned out great. I will definitely be making again. Thanks for the tips on buttering the top and baking with water/steam. The crust is perfect."
📖 Recipe
Chef Recipe: Bread Srsly’s Gluten Free Sourdough Bread
Easy gluten free sourdough bread.
Ingredients
- 2 cups gluten free flour blend (*see note)
- 1 ½ tsp Kosher salt
- ½ c sourdough starter (see post for directions to make this)
- water by feel
Instructions
- Put dry ingredients into a bowl and whisk together.
- Add water and sourdough starter.
- You want a dough that is wet like pancake batter.
- Let the dough rise for 12-24 hours at room temperature.
- **Put some aside to be used as your starter for another time.
- Put in a greased loaf pan and bake at 350-400 for one hour.
- Cool completely before slicing.
Notes
**There are a TON of tips and directions written into this post from myself and those who have made this recipe. I highly encourage you to read the whole post before starting this recipe.
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 6 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 213Total Fat: 1gSaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 1gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 587mgCarbohydrates: 45gFiber: 2gSugar: 0gProtein: 6g
Please note this nutrition information is calculated by a recipe plugin and is an estimate based on the ingredients used in this recipe.
Debby
I have a sourdough starter For baking regular Bread from my Daddy ( this batch since 2003) but have never had success making GF Bread or Buns/Rolls from it ‘Hope You can help’ ?
Sandi Gaertner
How cool that starter has been around since 2003!! I wish I could advise you. If it isn't a gluten free starter, I am not sure how to advise. I have never used a non-gf starter and I am not sure how it behaves versus a gluten free one. There is a gluten free sourdough Facebook Group, I advise asking there.
Deanna
Has anyone tried using this recipe in a bread machine?
Sandi Gaertner
Hi Deanna, I am unaware of anyone using a bread machine with my recipe. If you do try it, please come back and let us know how it turns out.
Jeri
I am going to try this in my bread machine and will let you know here how it turns out. This is a fabulous recipe and I have made it successfully before in a boule shape. But my last two bread attempts have not fared so well.
Sandi Gaertner
Please do let me know. Thank you Jeri!!
Charlotte
Do you have the original recipe that was posted here? I made it for years and knew it by heart.
Was it Millet, sorghum, white rice flour, xanthum, salt?
Thanks!!
Sandi Gaertner
Hi Charlotte, This is the quote from Sadie, who used a blend of millet, rice, and sorghum flours. The salt and xanthan gum are not used in the starter but they are in the bread: Mix together equal parts a flour of your choice and water. Avoid using pure starches like tapioca, corn or potato starch. Leave it in a bowl at room temperature, covered by a towel. Every 8-12 hours (2-3 times per day) add a little more flour and a little more water. After 3-5 days the mixture should start to smell sour and have some bubbles. Congratulations, you're almost there. Once your mixture is bubbling, add a little bit in to your bread mix. Do not use any yeast. Let this rise for at least 12 hours. Once the dough has risen, it will be your sourdough starter! Use a little bit of this dough in a fresh batch of dough. You'll be impressed at how vigorous your sourdough can be. Always save a cup or so of your last dough to use as a starter in your next batch. Keep it in the fridge, and be sure to "feed" it with fresh water and your blend of flour from the bread recipe at least once a week, but twice if you can."
Lise Shadle
After you let the dough rise for 12-24hrs, you suggest adding some more water and flour to feed the dough. How much do I add? Thanks 🙂
Sandi Gaertner
Hi Lise, I add enough to make the dough less liquidy then put it into the loaf pan. You can see the texture of the dough in the photos. The exact quantity will depend on the flour blend you used and how starchy it is. I hope this helps.
Dawn Marie Brown
Has anyone used an egg in this, or maybe apple cider vinegar, to make this rise more or not be so dense?
Sandi Gaertner
I sometimes add egg when I am using the starter for pizza crust, hopefully someone will respond for you.
Darienne
Hi,
Is it possible to make this recipe in a boule form?
Sandi Gaertner
Hi Darienne, this is really more of a loaf style. To make it boule form, you need to add more flour so the dough is workable with your hands...it also requires different baking instructions. I highly recommend checking out the Gluten Free Sourdough FB group for boule recipes.
Rylee
Hi,
I am new to gluten free baking and sometimes it completely flops. So, my bread looked really good. However on the inside it was a weird slimy like texture. Almost doughy. However the temp when I pulled it out was 205. What am I doing wrong?
Sandi Gaertner
Hi Rylee, I am happy to troubleshoot. Please tell me what gluten free flour blend you used, how long the starter has been going, what temperature you baked it at, did you include the hot water, and how long you let it cool? Please email me and send any photos you have and I will try to help.