Baking sourdough bread at high altitude can cause a few issues with your bread. Depending on how far above sea level you live, you may have issues with wet, sticky dough or lack of oven spring.
The main cause of problems when baking sourdough bread at high altitude are lower air pressure and drier air (caused by a lack of humidity).
If you are living in areas like Utah, Colorado or Wyoming, you might have found that your sourdough baking is affected by high altitude.
Everything You Need To Know About Sourdough Bread
This article aims to guide you through the process of baking a successful loaf of sourdough bread at higher altitude. It's not as difficult as you might think - you will just need to make a few tweaks to your recipe.
While it may seem insurmountable, these issues are very easy to fix. You will be able to bake amazing sourdough at higher altitudes.
The loaf below is an example of what can happen when baking bread at higher altitudes. The bread has no oven spring and is wide and flat. The crumb is dense and gummy.
Shortcut Sourdough Boule
The higher above sea level you go, the less humidity there is. This means that the air will be drier. Drier air will dry your ingredients out.
The higher you travel above sea level, the less humidity there is. This will make the air drier. On average, most higher altitude locations can experience humidity levels as low as 10 - 20%, in comparison to sea level locations, which can be as high as 80% humidity.
Drier air will mean drier ingredients. This is very important when using flour to bake sourdough. Flour at higher altitudes will be much drier and will absorb water differently.
High Altitude Sandwich Bread
This may mean you need to add more water to compensate for the drier flour. The trick is to not add it all at once because you may add too much!
When baking sourdough at higher altitude it's important to do an autolyse to make sure that the flour absorbs the water before you move on to the stretch and folds. This will give you an opportunity to add more water if necessary.
This is pertinent to sourdough because the wild yeast in your dough are releasing gasses as they feed on the starches in the flour. Bulk fermentation will happen much more quickly at high altitude because of these fast expanding gasses.
The Sourdough Recipes
Now that we understand the effect of low air pressure on sourdough, you can see how easily sourdough bread can be over fermented at higher altitudes.
Temperature will play a part of course, as it does for bulk fermentation at any altitude. But even in cooler temperatures, the air pressure will make a difference to your dough.
It's really just a matter of understanding what is causing the over fermentation of your bread and putting solutions in place to overcome them.
High Hydration Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread Recipe
Like all sourdough baking, you will find that a little experimentation is necessary to get a better bake. For example, you might prefer to increase the baking time rather than the baking temperature.
You will find that you'll need to increase the hydration of your sourdough to accomodate for the lack of moisture in the air at higher elevations.
This will be particularly important if you are using whole wheat and whole grain flours, as they typically require more water anyway.
Sourdough Bread Recipe
The best tip I can give you here is to not increase the hydration straight off the bat. Conduct the autolyse or fermentolyse period and then assess the dough after that.
My easy sourdough recipe sits at 71% hydration. Adding an extra 50g of water would bring it up to 81%. This is quite high hydration bread, but may be an essential addition to the success of your bread at higher altitudes.
The amount of sourdough starter can be important when baking at higher elevations because of the speed in which fermentation can happen.
Whole Wheat Sour Dough For The Home Baker
Because you need to shorten the bulk fermentation period when baking sourdough at high altitude, it can be helpful to perform extra stretch and folds to ensure the gluten network is strong enough.
This will also help with the structure of your sourdough, making for easy shaping. It will also help your dough not spread out when you tip it out of the banneton.
Given the lower air pressure at higher altitudes, you'll need to decrease the bulk fermentation time you give your sourdough. In short, fermentation time decreases as altitude increases.
Gluten Free Sourdough Bread Recipe With Sorghum And Millet (lectin Free)
We know that the air is drier above sea level due to the reduced humidity. This will not only dry out your flour before you mix your dough, it can also dry out the dough while it's fermenting and proving.
Elasticised plastic food covers are great for this purpose. They will ensure that your dough does not develop a dry and tough skin, which is is detrimental to good sourdough oven spring.
You will need to increase the temperature at which you bake at altitude. This can be difficult for sourdough though, because it's already baked at high temperatures.
High Altitude Baking
The general advice is to increase the baking temperature by about 25C. The alternative is to increase the baking time to ensure your sourdough is baked through.
While it's not essential, you can use a thermometer to check for doneness. You're looking for an internal temperature between 90.5 - 96C (195 - 205F).
Altitude does not have a profound affect on your sourdough starter. While there are many adjustments you'll need to make for a successful loaf of sourdough bread, your sourdough starter is more forgiving.
First Attempt At High Altitude Loaf!
If anything, you'll need to add slightly more water to compensate for the lower humidity levels and drier flour. If you are using whole wheat or whole grain flours, you may notice this more. In that case, a little more water will be necessary.
You many notice that your starter peaks quite quickly - this will be due to the lower air pressure. It's not a problem, however, if you want to extend the rise, you can feed the starter at a higher ration (1:2:2 for example).
If you don't already have a sourdough starter, you can use this easy guide to create your own sourdough starter from scratch.
Long Fermented Artisan Sourdough Bread
No - you can use the sourdough recipe you prefer. You will just need to make the adjustments listed above to ensure you have success at higher altitudes.
You will need to increase the baking temperature by about 25C from what is instructed in the recipe. The alternative to this is increasing baking time. You may need to experiment to find what works for you.
It's not essential to add more water to your sourdough starter if you live at higher altitude, however the lower humidity will cause the flour you use to be drier. If you feel that it's too dry, adding a little extra water will not hurt it.
Potato Flake Sourdough Bread
You'll need to make sure you cover your shaped dough with a plastic cover once it's shaped. The drier air at higher altitudes will mean that your dough can develop a dry skin which can be detrimental to good oven spring. You need moist dough to create the steam necessary for your sourdough to bloom in the oven.
This simple, tasty sourdough bread recipe has been adjusted to accomodate higher altitude elements. It will allow you to bake successful sourdough at higher elevations.
Please note this recipe is based on my original Simple Sourdough Recipe and has been adjusted to accomodate higher altitude elements. You may still have to make further adjustments to suit your unique environment and particular elevation.
Sourdough Banana Bread
Calories: 1851 kcal Carbohydrates: 372 g Protein: 61 g Fat: 8 g Saturated Fat: 1 g Sodium: 3904 mg Potassium: 501 mg Fiber: 12 g Sugar: 2 g Vitamin A: 10 IU Calcium: 88 mg Iron: 5 mgAfter months of testing and many, many loaves (I think my record was 9 in one week), I am very excited to share with you my recipe for High Altitude Sourdough Bread.
I’m a California girl. I grew up about an hour north of San Francisco, and sourdough bread, along with avocado, was probably my first solid food. Sourdough’s texture is slightly chewy, with a crisp crust, and its characteristic tangy flavor makes the
Grilled cheese and toast. It’s so flavorful, in my opinion, that I’m happy to eat it plain, without any butter or other adornment (very rarely the case with other kinds of bread).
Cranberry Walnut Orange Sourdough Bread
The essential difference is this: the majority of breads are leavened with commercial baker’s yeast, which is readily available, fast and easy to activate, and delivers consistent results. Sourdough bread, on the other hand, is made with an ancient process that harvests wild yeast from the environment (yes, yeast is floating all around us) using the medium of a fermented “starter, ” a lovely bubbly soup of yeast, bacteria, and acids that create carbon dioxide bubbles that will help your dough rise. The level of tang in your sourdough depends on the particular strains of yeast that exist in your environment and the acids that are produced. So my sourdough is likely to taste a little different from sourdough made in Seattle, say, or Atlanta.
Sourdough also typically
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