I Ruined 33 Loaves Before I Understood Sourdough

No one posts pictures of failed bread.

No one brags about dense crumb or pale crust.

Online, sourdough always looks perfect… until you make it yourself.

This is not a guide.

It’s a confession.

Because before I understood sourdough, I ruined 33 loaves. And no, that’s not a metaphor.

The myth of “doing it wrong”

When bread fails, we usually say:

“I must have done something wrong.”

The uncomfortable truth is this:

Sourdough doesn’t obey — it responds.

It responds to the weather, the flour, the time, your rush, your patience.

And sometimes, it responds with an ugly loaf.

Ugly bread, incredible flavor

One of my biggest failures was a loaf that was:

• Flat

• Torn in all the wrong places

• Shaped like a geological accident

I almost threw it away.

I tasted it out of obligation… and it turned out to be one of the best-tasting breads I’ve ever made.

That’s when I learned something important:

Appearance is optional. Flavor is not.

Many “failed” loaves are simply breads that don’t meet visual expectations — but they succeed at something far more important: they feed people.

Mistakes you can’t fix

Some mistakes have no solution:

• A weak starter can’t be saved with hope

• Overfermentation doesn’t reverse itself

• A structureless dough won’t improve in the oven

And that’s okay.

Sourdough doesn’t reward persistence — it rewards observation.

Every irreversible mistake teaches something:

• When to wait

• When to stop

• When to accept

The problem isn’t sourdough

The problem is how it’s sold to us.

We’re told it’s:

• Natural

• Gentle

• Intuitive

What no one mentions is that it’s also:

• Temperamental

• Slow

• Brutally honest

Sourdough never lies.

If the bread failed, something was out of balance — and it’s not always the recipe.

The day I stopped trying to control it

My bread improved the moment I stopped:

• Forcing timelines

• Adjusting everything to the minute

• Treating recipes like mathematical formulas

And started:

• Smelling

• Touching

• Waiting

That was loaf number 24.

It wasn’t perfect.

But it wasn’t a failure anymore.

What no one tells you

Making sourdough isn’t about learning how to bake bread.

It’s about learning how to tolerate failure.

Accepting that:

• Some loaves are only for learning

• Some are for eating

• And a few are for photographing

If your bread failed…

Don’t hide it.

Don’t throw it away without tasting it.

Don’t assume you’re bad at this.

You’re exactly where everyone starts — even if no one talks about it.

Because sourdough isn’t understood through success.

It’s understood through repeated failure.

Sometimes after 33 ruined loaves.