Want to make bakery-quality sourdough bread from home? Subscribe for the best sourdough guides and recipes to take your bread from ordinary to incredible.
Share
π School lunches, sorted.
Published 2 months agoΒ β’Β 3 min read
β
School lunches, sorted.
Back from summer travel (more on this in a future newsletter), and it's time to get these kids back to school.
β
The routine for me at this time of year is to bake a few loaves for their lunchesβwhether it's a white bread like pain de mie or more whole-grain options (read on!), it's just nice having fresh pan loaves cooling on the counter.
β
Of course, the day they're baked, it seems like half the loaf is eaten posthaste, that's what I make two.
β
But more than school lunches, these breads are super versatile, ranging from stellar French toast (cut super thick slices and let them dry out a bit on the counter overnight) to sandwiches with heirloom tomatoes from the garden. What could be better?
β
Here are a few of my fav pan loaves, I'm sure you're going to love them, too.
A whiter, softer bread that's still got loads of flavor thanks to the long fermentation time. This bread makes a mean turkey or ham sandwich just as well as a BLT.
Spelt is one of my favorite grains to bake with, and this pan bread lets it shine. Incredibly flavor-forward, this is one you'll want to savor for toasts, but it works well in a sando, too.
I don't think any lunchbox is complete without a little something sweet. These chocolate chip cookies certainly fit the bill (plus, there are a few waiting for you at the end, too).
I recall a few special lunches where I brought a thick slice or two of banana bread for lunch in place of a sandwichβwhat a treat, isn't it? To be able to eat banana bread for lunch as a kid and not even give it a thought further than, boy, this is good.
β
What's more, this is one of the breads I return to time and time again throughout the year, and while it might be a little early (I make this heavily in the fall, for some reason), it's perfectly at home in a school lunch as it is as a snack while you're reading your fav book.
Join the community at The Perfect Loaf and receive my baking tools and spreadsheets, exclusive discounts, a vast recipe archive (featuring scalable and adaptable recipes), real-time chatting with other bakers and me in the community, and access to the website completely ad-free.
How do you manage a "ripe starter" by 8:45 am for the start of this recipe schedule? Are you pushing back your previous night's feeding closer to midnight to ensure it is ripe around 8:45 a.m.? βIn general, this process has confused me when I need a ripe starter directly in a recipe (like this) or when making the levain, as most recipes start first thing in the morning. If a starter usually achieves peak ripeness around 8-10 hours after feeding, the feeding would need to occur around 12:45 a.m. How are you achieving ripeness by 8:45 a.m.?
Generally, it's okay to use your starter an hour or two before it's perfectly "peak." There is no perfect time. If there's a large delta, you can feed your starter a little earlier the night before to shift it a few hours. That way, it has time to ripen.
β
If you need to delay it a bit, you can feed later, use slightly cooler water, or leave less starter in the jar (all of these will slow it down)!
βIs the Bread in Europe Better for You? (NY Times). Different wheat, longer fermentation, fewer additivesβthese all sound like good moves, in my opinion π β
Want to make bakery-quality sourdough bread from home? Subscribe for the best sourdough guides and recipes to take your bread from ordinary to incredible.
Granola I can't stop snacking on Sourdough in granola!? At first, the idea of adding sourdough discard to granola might sound unconventional. But gosh, it really does work! I've been making granola for ages, and often recipes will call for adding some type of flour (usually oat flour). Well, adding sourdough starter discard serves the same function and acts as a binding agent to help the granola clump together and form bark (oh, I love those large shards!). This is definitely my favorite...
A travelogue: The Perfect Loaf's trip to Northern Italy I'm back after leading two groups of The Perfect Loaf readers on a week-long sourdough workshop and a tour of some of the best food spots in northern Italy. We had a blast, and it was so, so great to meet so many readers. What did we see and do? Check out my recap post here: READ ITALY 2025 RECAP β I'd also love to know, where should I lead the next trip? Where would you like to visit? Sicily (ancient grain traditions, cannoli,...
How I make the softest sourdough pretzels Whew, jet lag is the real deal. I'm back home from Italy after two weeks of going overboard on gelato, pizza, and pastaβas one does on a successful trip. I'll have more about the trip soon, but today... Let's talk about pretzels (and a few other tasty fall things). Tender and chewy pretzels are the first thing I make when I even slightly detect the cooler nights of fall approaching. Using a lengthy sourdough fermentation for pretzels amplifies the...