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Traditional sourdough ciabatta recipe, classic Italian bread
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Traditional sourdough ciabatta recipe, classic Italian bread

Total Time1 day
Course: Side Dish
Cuisine: Italian
Keyword: bread, chiabatta, sourdough
Servings: 6 ciabattas

Ingredients

For the dough

  • 17,63 oz all purpose flour 500g
  • 2,11 oz milk 60g
  • 13,52 floz luke warm water 400ml
  • 0,52 oz fresh yeast 15g
  • 2 tsp salt
  • 1,69 floz olive oil 50ml

For the sponge

  • 12,34 oz all purpose flour 350g
  • 6,76 floz warm water 200ml
  • 0,35 oz fresh yeast 10g

Instructions

  • PREPARING THE SPONGE:
    Measure the ingredients and take the time to do the sponge and dough by directions; otherwise, you won't get the right results!
    Dissolve the yeast in warm water. Add the flour in a large pot and pour in the yeast mixture.
    Knead the ingredients around 10 minutes until you get a nice and soft dough. Leave the dough in pot and cover it tightly with cling film. Leave it to rise and rest for 15 hours at room temperature.
    HINT: The pot should be very large so that the ingredients for the sponge and later for the dough could be mixed in it together.
  • PREPARING THE DOUGH:
    After 15 hours when the sponge is ready:
    Dissolve the yeast in warm water. Add the yeast mixture into the sponge. Mix the mixture with a spoon or your hand for a minute until the ingredients start to mix together. Add milk and then use an electric mixer and begin mixing the dough. Mix the dough for around 3 minutes. At this stage, the mixture should have a very liquid consistency.
  • When you finished mixing slowly, start to add flour. The best way is to separate the flour into three parts. First, add the first part and mix a little (for a minute), add the second part, mix a little (for a minute), and finally add the third part.
  • After you added all the flour, knead the dough with your hand or in a dough mixture for about 12 minutes. Then add the oil and salt. Knead for another 3-5 minutes. When finished, the dough will have unusually wet consistency and will stick to your hands. If you measured all the ingredients right, everything will be fine.
  • Cover the pot tightly with cling film and set aside to rest and rise for 2 hours. The dough will rise a lot, so you must use a very big pot, so the dough doesn't have problems with space while rising.
  • Cut a big piece of baking paper, put it on a baking pan, and sprinkle it with flour. Take as much dough as you need for 1 ciabatta and shape it into a loaf. Original recipe yields 6 ciabattas.
    If you have problems shaping the dough because of its consistency, fold the baking paper in to sort of canals and pour the dough into these canals.
  • When the dough is shaped, leave it to rest for half an hour.
    Preheat the oven on 220 C (about 430 F).
    Just before you put the ciabattas in the oven sprinkle them with flour. Bake for a little less than half an hour.
    When baked, take them off the baking paper and leave them to cool