A small sourdough journal

Honest sourdough, one loaf at a time.

Tested guides from a home kitchen: your first loaf, a happy starter and a confident score. Real weights, real timings and how the dough should feel at every stage.

Read the guides Meet the bakers

From the journal

3 guides

A scored sourdough loaf resting on a sage linen cloth in a small wooden crate

Featured guide

Sourdough basics
techniques

Your first sourdough loaf, start to finish helo

A calm two-day plan for a crackly, open-crumbed loaf, with exact weig hello hts, timings and what the dough should feel like at every stage.

Walter Braandt5 October 20264 2 min read

Risen dough in a glass bowl under a linen towel on a marble counter

Sourdough basics
Starter care

Feeding your starter: a simple weekly rhythm

How to keep a starter strong with ten minutes a week, whether you bake every day or once a month.

Walter Braandt14 October 20263 2 min read

Two golden baguettes with deep, open score marks resting on a linen cloth

techniques

Scoring 101: three cuts every baker should know

Why scoring matters, how to hold the blade, and three patterns that work on almost any loaf.

Tomasz Ruda30 September 20263 2 min read

The bakers

The people behind every loaf

Every guide is baked at least three times before it is written up, then photographed on the same kitchen table it was made on.

Walter in a white baker's cap and apron, looking down at the dough he is shaping

Walter Braandt

Head baker

Walter baked for forty years in his family's bakery before turning his home kitchen into a classroom. He writes the methods here and tests each one at least three times before it goes up.

Tomasz smiling in a pale blue shirt against a warm beige wall

Tomasz Ruda

Photographer and apprentice

Tomasz photographs every loaf on Crumb Notes and is still learning at Walter's elbow. He writes from the beginner's side of the bench, which is why his guides skip nothing.