Sourdough bread baking is an art form that truly takes precision, patience, and a dash of passion. There’s plenty of rising, stretching, shaping, and folding involved in crafting that perfect loaf. It can feel exhilarating one minute and a little intimidating the next, especially when you’re aiming for consistent results. That’s precisely why I’ve put together this indispensable list of sourdough bread making supplies and tools.

Even if you’ve already found your go-to sourdough bread recipe, these thoughtfully chosen tools are designed to simplify and enhance every aspect of the process. I only recommend products that I personally use, trust, and absolutely love in my own kitchen, ensuring they meet the highest standards for performance and durability.

Essential Sourdough Baking Tools for Every Baker

Here are the top essential sourdough bread tools that will help you consistently achieve that sought-after golden, crusty, and tangy loaf!

Banneton Proofing Basket

While not strictly mandatory for a successful loaf, a banneton proofing basket has undeniably enhanced my bread baking experience by leaps and bounds. Its primary purpose is to hold your shaped dough during its final rise, providing structure and preventing it from spreading outwards. This crucial support encourages a better vertical rise in the oven, leading to a more aesthetically pleasing and well-formed loaf.

If you properly flour the banneton, the dough should not stick, making for a clean release. Beyond its functional benefits, it leaves a beautiful, distinctive swirl design on the crust, which adds a professional touch to your homemade bread. Bannetons typically come in both round and oval shapes to accommodate different loaf preferences. For that iconic spiral pattern, remember to use the basket without its cloth liner.

Round Scrub Brush for Banneton

This simple yet incredibly effective round scrub brush, equipped with durable bristles, performs double duty in your sourdough routine. It makes flouring your banneton basket an absolute breeze and simplifies the cleaning process significantly! Using this brush is far less messy than attempting to flour the basket with your hands, and its bristles expertly work the flour into every groove, ensuring the dough won’t stick during proofing.

Once your magnificent sourdough loaf is baked and cooled, you can use the brush again to effortlessly remove any excess flour or tiny dough remnants from the basket, keeping it pristine and ready for your next baking adventure. It’s a small investment that yields big returns in terms of convenience and hygiene.

Flour Shaker (Dredger)

A flour shaker is an indispensable tool for any baker, offering a quick and efficient way to evenly coat any surface with flour. Whether you’re dusting your workbench, preparing your banneton, or lightly flouring your dough before handling, a flour shaker ensures a consistent, thin layer without clumps. These handy devices are typically inexpensive and distribute flour effortlessly, preventing sticky situations and making dough handling much cleaner and more manageable. It’s a small gadget that makes a big difference in maintaining a tidy and effective baking environment.

Silicone Scraper

Do yourself a favor and invest in more than one silicone scraper! This must-have tool is incredibly versatile and excels at removing sticky dough from a mixing bowl with remarkable ease. Its light, flexible, yet sturdy design allows you to conform to the curves of any bowl, ensuring you get every last bit of dough without waste. Beyond just dough, its small size and ergonomic design make it perfect for scraping down the sides of bowls when making batters, frostings, or even for general kitchen cleanup. It takes up virtually no room in a drawer and is completely dishwasher-safe for effortless cleaning.

Small Silicone Spatula (Spoonula)

Don’t underestimate the power of mini tools – they can often do everything a big tool can do, and sometimes even more efficiently! A small silicone spatula, often called a spoonula, is less bulky and perfectly fits into small, narrow spaces. I find it absolutely essential for stirring my sourdough starter, especially when feeding it, and for efficiently scraping every last bit of starter off the sides of the container or jar. This minimizes waste and ensures all the starter gets incorporated.

Truth be told, I have more than one mini spatula, and I love them all for their incredible versatility. I use them for countless tasks beyond just bread making, like scooping the last bit of peanut butter or jam out of a stubborn jar, getting into corners of small saucepans, or even for precise mixing of ingredients. Their heat resistance and flexibility make them indispensable.

Digital Kitchen Scale

When it comes to bread baking, especially sourdough, precision is not just helpful—it’s absolutely critical. Measuring dry ingredients by volume (using cups) is notoriously inaccurate because flour can pack differently depending on how it’s scooped. That’s why I strongly advocate for using a digital kitchen scale instead of measuring cups to weigh out all your ingredients, especially flour and water.

Weighing ensures you achieve the exact hydration and ingredient ratios specified in your recipe, leading to the same glorious, consistent results every single time. A scale eliminates guesswork, providing the accuracy needed for repeatable success in sourdough, where the balance of ingredients profoundly impacts the texture, rise, and flavor of your finished loaf.

Bread Cloche / Baking Dome

This is, without a doubt, the best vessel for baking sourdough bread. I used to bake my sourdough loaves in my trusty Dutch oven, but over time, the intense heat and steam caused some discoloration on the inside. I decided to try a dedicated bread cloche instead, and I couldn’t be happier with the results! The design of a bread cloche is specifically optimized for bread.

The lid traps the steam released by the dough during the initial baking phase, much like a professional steam-injected oven. This humid environment is crucial for creating that coveted thin, crispy, and chewy crust that is the hallmark of artisanal sourdough. It’s also typically easier to load and unload than a deep Dutch oven, simple to clean, often dishwasher-safe, and many designs look absolutely beautiful sitting on the kitchen counter.

Reusable Shower Cap / Dough Cover

Say goodbye to constantly reaching for plastic wrap and creating unnecessary waste! A reusable shower cap is an ingenious and perfect solution for covering proofing bread dough, nurturing your homemade sourdough starter, or even keeping last night’s leftovers fresh. Unlike cling film, it can be washed and reused countless times, making it an eco-friendly and cost-effective choice.

There’s no need to transfer food to a new container, thus creating more dishes to wash. It’s a win-win situation for both convenience and sustainability! I personally reuse a single shower cap multiple times before washing, extending its life and maximizing its utility in my kitchen.

Bread Lame (Scoring Tool)

A lame (pronounced “lahm”) is a specialized, razor-sharp scoring blade designed with a comfortable handle, making it the ultimate tool for scoring your sourdough dough. While a sharp paring knife can technically do the trick, a dedicated lame cuts seamlessly and precisely through the dough without partially collapsing or gouging it. This precision is vital because scoring isn’t just for aesthetics; it directs the dough’s expansion in the oven, allowing it to achieve a beautiful “ear” and a more even, open crumb.

It’s perfect for creating detailed designs or artistic cuts that require defined, clean lines, allowing you to personalize your loaves. Most lames come with a protective leather or plastic cover to secure the ultra-sharp blade when it’s not in use, ensuring safety and prolonging the blade’s sharpness.

Fine Mist Spray Bottle

A simple spray bottle can be a secret weapon for achieving that truly professional sourdough crust. Lightly coating your sourdough loaf with a fine mist of water just before it bakes produces a wonderfully thick, golden crust with an appealing sheen. The added moisture on the surface creates steam, which keeps the crust pliable longer in the oven, allowing the loaf to expand fully before the crust sets.

A high-quality spray bottle ensures an even misting of the bread without soaking it, which could otherwise create an undesirable texture. This effortless step makes a noticeable difference in the final appearance and texture of your homemade sourdough.

Bench Scraper (Dough Scraper)

Sourdough recipes often feature a higher percentage of water (high hydration) to achieve that signature soft, open texture, a thin, crispy crust, and a mild tang. However, high-hydration doughs can be notoriously wet, sticky, and challenging to work with by hand. This is where a sturdy bench scraper becomes an invaluable asset.

A bench scraper simplifies the process immensely, making it easier to gather, shape, divide, and handle sticky doughs without making a huge mess or sacrificing your patience. It allows you to clean your work surface efficiently, scoop up dough, and gently manipulate it during shaping, ensuring a smoother and more controlled baking experience.

Instant-Read Thermometer (with Infrared)

This multi-talented thermometer, often featuring both a probe and an infrared setting, is a game-changer for sourdough bakers. An instant-read probe thermometer is crucial for checking the internal temperature of your finished loaf to ensure it’s perfectly baked through (typically around 200-210°F or 93-99°C). But the infrared function takes it a step further: an infrared thermometer can detect the surface temperature of an object without even touching it.

This is incredibly useful for ensuring your water is at the optimal temperature for activating yeast in your starter or dough. Warm water encourages yeast to grow vigorously, while scorching hot water can kill it completely, and too cold water can significantly slow down fermentation. I like to accurately check the temperature of my water and even my dough during bulk fermentation beforehand for consistent and reliable results every single time, ensuring a successful rise.

Essential Sourdough Baking Supplies

While every sourdough recipe has its unique nuances, I’ve found these core supplies to be absolutely crucial for my successful sourdough bread baking endeavors. Having them on hand ensures you’re always ready to whip up a fantastic loaf.

Active Sourdough Starter

Also affectionately known as levain, this living, breathing essential ingredient is the heart and soul of sourdough bread. It’s a dynamic mixture of flour and water that is left to ferment naturally. Wild yeast and beneficial bacteria, ever-present in our environment, colonize this mixture, feeding on the carbohydrates in the hydrated flour. As they consume these sugars, they produce gas (which leavens the bread) and a host of complex flavor compounds that give sourdough its distinctive tangy taste and aroma. You can either embark on the rewarding journey of making your own sourdough starter from scratch, or you can purchase a mature, active starter online or from a local bakery to kickstart your baking immediately.

Rice Flour

For dusting my banneton basket, I highly recommend using rice flour. It stands out from other flours because it is significantly less absorbent than traditional bread flour or all-purpose flour. This low absorbency makes it a superior barrier between your often sticky dough and the basket, virtually guaranteeing a clean release every time. It ensures that the dough doesn’t stick to the banneton’s surface, preserving the beautiful patterns and preventing any tearing when you invert the dough onto your baking surface.

High-Quality Bread Flour

The name truly says it all. Bread flour is specifically milled for bread making and has a significantly higher protein content (typically 12-14%) compared to all-purpose flour. More protein means more gluten development, which is absolutely essential for sourdough. Gluten forms a strong elastic network that traps the gases produced by the yeast, allowing the bread to achieve an impressive rise and providing the foundational structure and desired chewy texture.

Working with bread flour is generally easier, especially if you’re making sourdough for the first time, as its strong gluten development is more forgiving and helps to prevent your dough from collapsing.

Why Invest in Dedicated Sourdough Tools?

You might be wondering if all these specific tools are truly necessary. While it’s possible to bake a decent loaf with minimal equipment, investing in dedicated sourdough tools offers several significant advantages that elevate your baking experience and results:

• Consistency: Specialized tools like digital scales and thermometers remove guesswork, ensuring precise measurements and conditions for repeatable success.
• Improved Technique: Tools like the bench scraper and lame are designed to make handling and shaping sticky, high-hydration dough much easier and more effective, helping you develop better technique.
• Superior Results: A bread cloche provides the ideal steamy environment for a beautiful crust and oven spring, while a banneton offers crucial support for shaping and a professional finish.
• Efficiency and Enjoyment: Having the right tool for the job streamlines each step, reduces mess, and makes the entire sourdough process more enjoyable and less frustrating.
• Durability and Longevity: High-quality tools are built to last, providing reliable service for countless loaves to come, making them a worthwhile long-term investment for any dedicated baker.

More Baking Resources:

• 12 Not Essential, but Nice to Have Kitchen Tools and Gadgets
• 22 Baking Essentials for Beginner Bakers
• 11 Versatile Uses for Cookie Scoops in Your Kitchen
• My Favorite Small Kitchen Appliances for Efficient Cooking

Whether you’re a baking newbie just starting your sourdough adventure or a seasoned baking extraordinaire looking to refine your craft, I sincerely hope this comprehensive list of essential sourdough bread tools makes the process simple, enjoyable, and incredibly rewarding for you. Happy baking!