No knead sourdough is a much easier way to make a true sourdough at home – this is my personal favourite, with honey, oats, and whole wheat spelt flour. The method is simple and you can use normal yeast instead of a starter if you don’t have one. Either way you end up with a beautiful crusty loaf. Skip to the recipe →
I’ve been making sourdough for the past year and a half or so but haven’t quite gotten the hang of the whole folding and shaping thing yet. I think it’s partly because I use lower gluten flours like spelt and rye, which can be a bit trickier to shape and stretch. No-knead is ideal for people without a large breadth of knowledge about sourdough but who still want the health benefits, and ideal if you want fresh bread without the effort of kneading.
I’ve started rotating between this honey and oat spelt sourdough, overnight spelt rye, and my overnight dark rye bread. For this loaf I used an old covered pyrex dish but a dutch oven is more effective if you have one, and I usually just use a plain old loaf tin. If you use a loaf tin it’s more like sandwich bread in texture as well as shape, because it doesn’t get as crusty on the outside. To make it fully vegan you just sub maple syrup or coconut sugar for the honey, no problem.
So why sourdough? This is a totally appropriate recipe for beginners, and sourdough has so many benefits. It’s much better for digestion and digestive health, can help to reduce inflammation, has a better flavour, and it’s ideal for people with some gluten sensitivity. This spelt sourdough is even better if you’re sensitive to gluten, like I am, because it’s an older grain variety and the longer fermentation time makes it much easier on your system.
There was a study done a few years ago that showed that even celiac people may be able to consume sourdough – a true sourdough degrades the gluten enough to consume, and also reduces FODMAPs, and spelt is also low in FODMAPs. You can read more about that here. Regular bread gives me crazy bloating and stomach-ache but I feel good when I eat a proper sourdough like this. It’s a good source of probiotics and although I can’t prove it, I’m sure that eating sourdough and drinking fermented drinks like ginger beer and kombucha helped to clear my eczema along with other diet changes.
There’s also some evidence showing infammation may be a cause of depression, so eating foods that reduce inflammation can help with mental illnesses like depression, and that’s been the case for me as well.
The method here is laughably simple. You just toss everything in a bowl, stir, and leave it overnight and part of the next day. So mix before bed, then bake it when you get home from work. I’ve given a couple variations on cooking – for a really crusty loaf you have to heat the baking dish along with the oven, and in a loaf tin the bread rises for another hour. Either way, super simple with great results. The crumb is good, the flavour is phenomenal, and it’s virtually impossible to find a homemade bread that’s less work!
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• To make a regular sandwich bread, place the risen dough into a well-greased or lined bread tin. Sprinkle some flour over it, cover with a tea towel, and let it rise again for another hour. Preheat the oven to 200C / 400F and bake for 40-45 minutes, then cool for another 20 before removing from the tin. Cool completely before slicing. • If you're unfamiliar with a sourdough starter, Nataša over at My Daily Sourdough Bread has a great step-by-step tutorial that'll show you how to make your own. I started mine a couple of years ago using her guidelines and it's still going strong. * You have to use a minimum of 1/4 cup / 50 grams starter, but if you have some to use up, I often use a 1/2 cup / 100 grams, or even a little more. I don't find that it makes a difference in this recipe as it's not as exact as many sourdough recipes. ** I think that you can substitute normal yeast in this recipe, but I haven't yet tried it. I think 1/4 teaspoon of dry yeast or a pea-sized amount of fresh yeast in place of the starter will work. I'll update the recipe when I do try, but until then, substitute this at your own risk! *** Maple syrup is an ideal substitute but you could also use date syrup, coconut sugar, etc.Easy No-Knead Honey and Oat Spelt Sourdough
Ingredients
Instructions
Notes
I’m unfamiliar with rye starter… do I need to special order something like this?
Hi Carole! It's a normal sourdough starter, what's needed to bake a true sourdough. I make it myself, just adding 2 tbsp each water and rye flour to a jar and mixing, adding every day, until it's bubbling. Nataša from mydailysourdoughbread.com has a great step-by-step tutorial for it. It's really easy to make yourself! I think you can buy starters online but I'm not sure – it'll be about a week from starting that yours will be ready to go if you make it yourself 🙂
I don’t have spelt- but I have rye, amaranth, coconut, almond and whole wheat flours. Thoughts?! Can I sub all rye?
Hi Rebecca! I would suggest doing a mix of rye and whole wheat in this case – a bit more like my overnight rye bread, but keep everything else the same.
Just curious if you’ve used a shorter proof time… I’ve just made it but realized I only have 13 proof window before I wanted to use it… I’ve also used 150g of starter.
Hi Emma! I have, just added a little extra starter and kept the dough in a warm-ish spot. I’m sure it’ll be fine with 13 hours proofing.
Hi there! So I’m very interested in making this loaf…however, I have never made a sourdough before so I am very unfamiliar with starters. Is there a particular recipe you used for this one that you could walk us through? It would be super helpful!
Hi Courtney! Happy to hear that you’d like to make this bread 🙂 I recommend following this tutorial if you’re completely unfamiliar, it should set you in the right direction!
I only have whole wheat flour and oats at the moment, will this bread work if i just sub wheat for the spelt?
That’ll be totally fine, go for it!
I finally bought a bunch of spelt flour and I want to make this loaf. I think I’ll use more starter because I don’t have a rye starter (or any rye flour and I have too many different flours to buy yet another kind).
If I make it in a loaf tin, would I need to divide the dough into 2 tins? The amount of flour seems to be more than normally called for in a loaf recipe. How does it turn out when you make it in a loaf tin?
Hi Grace! Depending on the size of your loaf tin, you probably don’t have to split it into two. A standard bread tin will be fine, but if you find that your dough is a bit much, then it’s no problem to split it into two. It doesn’t turn out as crusty as it does in a dutch oven, but it makes a very good sandwich bread when baked in a tin. You can see my overnight dark rye as an example (though the honey oat bread tends to have a bit more oven spring).
I’m excited to use this recipe for my first sourdough, I’m going to use 3 cups of Spelt and 1 cup of Rye along with my rye starter, I’m curious if the same recipe will all work without the rolled oats.
Hi Matt, I hope it worked out! It sounds much like my overnight spelt rye bread and that’s a great everyday recipe : )
I made your recipe this weekend, using my spelt starter and freshly ground organic spelt berries. It fermented at RT for 19 hours. I shaped it and placed it in a banneton for 40 minutes, then baked it as instructed.
I was very happy with the result, a tasty loaf, so easy to make.
I used half organic full fat yogurt and half water.
I intend to try your other 2 loaves and shared your recipe in our FB group, Whole Grain Sourdough Baker, so hopefully more will try it.
Thank you for the lovely recipe.