SourTube: How to Store a Loaf of Sourdough Without Ruining It (feat. Dough My Goodness Bakery)

📺 SourTube pick: This is a curated video — we didn't make it, we just love it and think you will too. All credit belongs to the creator below. Watch it, learn from it, then go show them some love.

Today's pick: How to Store a Loaf of Sourdough Without Ruining It

Creator: Dough My Goodness Bakery — Annette, a Chicago microbaker who sells artisan loaves, bagels, scones, and rolls from her neighborhood bakery. She teaches sourdough like someone who's watched thousands of loaves leave her oven and knows exactly what happens to them afterward.
Watch on YouTube: How to Store a Loaf of Sourdough Without Ruining It
More from Annette: find her on YouTube at @Dough_My_Goodness_Bakery and her bakery at doughmygoodnessbakery.com for more real-world bread know-how.

If the embed doesn't load, watch it directly on YouTube here.

Why we picked this one

Be honest: how many times have you pulled a gorgeous loaf out of the oven, admired your crackling crust like it was a trophy, and then watched it turn into a rubbery tragedy by the next afternoon? 🥖 Storing sourdough is one of those topics nobody teaches you when you're learning to bake — you nail the crumb, you nail the ear, and then the actual EATING part falls apart because your storage game is trash. This video is the fix.

Annette's big idea is that storing a loaf is a balancing act between two forces: letting it breathe and keeping it from drying out. Most of the storage advice floating around the internet picks one side and gets it exactly backwards — and she's refreshingly blunt about it. Her take: when in doubt, err toward dry rather than trapping moisture, because a slightly dry loaf can be revived but a soggy, sweaty one is gone forever. That single reframe made us look at every bread box and plastic bag in the kitchen with new eyes.

She walks through the real roles of linen bags, bread boxes, and — the one everyone argues about — the fridge, with the kind of practical confidence you only get from running an actual microbakery. You'll learn why airtight plastic at room temperature is basically the fastest way to ruin a loaf (moisture trapped against the crust = gummy, sad bread), how to freeze bread properly so it thaws like it just came out of the oven, and — the part we wish every beginner video included — how to bring a dried-out loaf back to life with exact oven temperatures and timing. No more quietly throwing away the last third of every loaf.

This one's perfect for anyone whose baking has leveled up past "please just don't be flat" and into "okay, now how do I actually ENJOY this all week?" If you've ever refrigerated a loaf thinking you were preserving it (spoiler: you were drying it out), press play. Annette will set you straight in the nicest possible way.

What you'll learn

• The breathe-vs-dry balancing act: why storing sourdough is about letting it breathe while preventing it from drying out — and why erring toward dry is the safer bet.
• What each storage method actually does: linen bags, bread boxes, the fridge, and why airtight plastic at room temperature ruins your crust.
• Freezing and reviving done right: how to freeze a loaf properly for long-term storage, plus exact oven time and temperature for bringing a dried-out loaf back to life.

Our two cents to go with it

Two things worth knowing before you press play:

1. Always cool the loaf COMPLETELY first. This is the storage step zero that no one stresses enough: trapping heat and steam around a fresh loaf creates a humid little greenhouse that invites mold and gums up the crust. Let your bread sit out uncovered until it's truly room temperature — at least a couple of hours for a boule — before any bag, box, or wrap touches it. Patience now, crispy crust later.

2. Cut from the middle, store cut-side down. Slice the loaf in half straight through the middle, take your slices from the exposed faces, then stand the two halves up with their cut sides flat against the cutting board. The crust becomes its own protective wrapper — nature's bread bag. For the first day or two, this alone keeps a loaf fresher than any storage gadget.

And if watching this makes you want to be the kind of baker who has a glorious loaf sitting on the counter worth protecting — but your starter situation is more "science experiment" than "routine" — that's the exact headache ours was built to solve. Ours arrives dehydrated, wakes up in days with dead-simple instructions, and settles into the kind of reliable rhythm that keeps fresh loaves coming and crusts worth talking about. Grab your Squirrelly Girl Starter here 🐿️

Loved this video? Go tell Annette — like and subscribe on YouTube so she keeps making them.

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