When bread is made with no preservatives, it gets stale faster.
This is completely normal, but these are some tips and tricks on how to revive stale sourdough bread.
Why Does Bread Go Stale?
First off, let’s understand a little on what actually makes bread go stale. Basically, it is because of the movement of water. When water moves out of the loaf towards the crust and into the air, the starch molecules rearrange and re-harden, rendering the bread hard.
Even if we live in Malaysia, which is a pretty humid country, this might still happen after 3 or 4 days.
Basically, our problem is to witness the battle between staling and moulding, both of which occur at quite similar rates compared to if we were a colder country, in which case, staling would be the more prominent.
How to Revive Stale Sourdough Bread?
When it’s been a couple of days, and your loaf is feeling rather hard, follow these steps to have seemingly fresh bread again.
- First, preheat your oven to about 230 degrees Celsius.
- Run your loaf quickly under tap water, just to coat the outside surface lightly with water. If you loaf has already been sliced, try to just wet the crust. But even if some water gets into the crumb (inside of the loaf), it’s alright.
- Place your wet loaf on a baking paper and pan, and insert it into the pre-heated oven for about 5 to 7 minutes. When it comes out, it’ll be smelling heavenly and will be close to its former level of crustiness and softness.
One thing to note about this method, is that it only works for whole and partial loaves. If your loaf has already been pre-sliced, then it won’t work.
But you should never slice your loaves to store at room temperature. Here are some tips for proper storing of sourdough bread. So that you don’t have to try reviving your bread so often.
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See you in our next article! Thanks for reading, and happy baking!
