If you are the kind of person that doesn’t like the truth… this blog post is not for you. If you are like one lady who felt I had no right to an opinion about whether I liked a certain brand of flour or that everything must be neat, tidy and kind. Then this post is not for you. If you are the kind of person who likes cheap bread filled with chemicals…this post is not for you. If you are not used to real artisan and sourdough bread… bye. If you don’t really like an honest review of something… go away…
Now… you can’t say you weren’t warned!
As many of you know, I often will purchase random sourdough or artisan breads when I am out and about and then review them. I have found some surprisingly good sourdough bread in unlikely places and some not so good sourdough in more places than I care to remember. This is one of those times.
I picked up a loaf of Seattle Sourdough from a store in town. It looked good through the packaging. It hefted nicely at 24 oz. Once I got it home, I tried it out. Was I ever disappointed. The sourdough bread wasn’t as bad as some I have tasted, but I was disappointed not only in the flavor and texture, but for other reasons.
The flavor was … not there. Sure there was a slight acidic taste as it went past the back of the tongue, but other than that, there were no complex flavors at all. The bread was dryish and clumped into a pasty ball in your mouth when you tried to chew it. Perhaps if I got a loaf right off of the cooling rack, I might have a different story to tell. I do have to give them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t really know how many days out of the bakery this bread was.
What I do know however, is that it is NOT sourdough bread. There was NO sourdough culture listed in the ingredients. There was yeast (which means commercial yeast) and for flavor and acidity they used distilled VINEGAR (!) The Ascorbic Acid added some acidity as well, but is used mainly as a dough conditioner, making the dough stronger.
On the front of the bag, it says, “Naturally aged sourdough.” I wonder what that means? Naturally aged? Aged with commercial yeast? Sourdough? I don’t think so. There were no flavors or textures to suggest it was real fermented sourdough at all.
I am disappointed for several reasons. I am proud to be a Washingtonian and Seattle is our place. To suggest this is Seattle Sourdough is to say Seattle can’t produce world quality sourdough bread. I can’t believe that is true. They should have stuck to their company name, “Franz.” Franz Sourdough, leave out the name Seattle please. Here is a link to their website describing this bread:
http://www.usbakery.com/products/french-and-sourdough/seattle-international-sourdough-round
I found that some of the breads on their site did say made with “sourdough culture.” However, it makes me wonder if the sourdough culture they list is just dumped into the batch along with commercial yeast or if they actually do take time to ferment the dough to make REAL sourdough. I did find one bread listed on their site that did list sourdough culture as one of the ingredients. It was the Sourdough Garlic bread:
http://www.usbakery.com/products/french-and-sourdough/seattle-international-garlic-sourdough-round
Using vinegar in bread and calling is sourdough is … is… well, it’s a crime. It just shouldn’t be done. Besides the crust being a bit dry and crumbly, it seems as if they have a fairly good chance at producing a decent crust. The bread itself is edible, it is just disappointing.
So I challenge you Franz, contact Bread Bakers Guild of America and see if you can get some help learning how to produce real sourdough in a large bakery environment. I know it isn’t easy, but perhaps there are some things you can change to allow your dough to ferment longer using real sourdough culture that will help make your “Sourdough” bread real sourdough bread and not “Vinegardough” bread. Maybe even a morph of sourdough culture with a longer ferment and a spike of commercial yeast to jumpstart the process and make the timing more dependable for a large bakery.
I challenge you because I think you have it in you to produce some of the best sourdough in the Northwest and make us here in Washington and Seattle proud. I think we have the right to ask for this since it reflects on us here in Washington… don’t you Washingonians think so?
Go for it….. I will be the first to give you a great review once you succeed.
Well the “Ingredients” of this bread are more close to the rocket fuel rather than sourdough bread!
I used to think Seattle Sourdough was really good until I started making my own. I no longer buy sourdough from the store . I make about 10 loaves a week and share with my daughter. I use no commercial yeast. I slice and freeze it fresh because with no preservatives it has a short life span. It comes out of the freezer like it was baked that day. Love the homemade bread
To tell the truth is an obligation. Moral relativism – any type of equivocating is a lie and a sin. Truth is like pure clean water. Keep it up.
The crust looks like soft French bread. I bake a better looking loaf with you recipe than the one pictured.
After reading your blog, I was thinking of changing my name. I am a retired old man who loves to bake good sourdough bread. I have seen with some disgust other vinegar dough breads in other stores and other countries. I am glad you had the courage to expose this practice. Not long ago I wrote a blog on another sourdough site telling a newcomer that he does not need a big crock to maintain his culturers, and that i am successfully using 60 ml plastic containers to maintain mine quite successfully. I gave him a formula to build up the quantity of starter in two or three feedings. When my comments did not show up I thought I had made a mistake. I submitted another one which showed up, but was later again removed. Maybe some folks who make a living selling crocks to the hombakers or someone who determined that my given formula was nonesens had my comments removed. I am happy to see that this site is not that timid or sensative.
I am glad to see that other people feel as I do about vingegar dough bread. Nice to hear from you Franz.
The ingredients they use are really a cause for concern. The mold inhibitors aren’t needed with sourdough. When we were running our bakery we did some informal aging tests and found sourdough was naturally mold free for about 21 days.
Worse, some of the enzymes used in bread making convert gluten into a form that is very hard on people with gluten sensitivities. In contrast to this, a number of recent studies show that celiacs can safely eat some sourdoughs. (Note – this is early science, if you’re a celiac don’t change your diet until more studies are done and your health care professional approves the changes). Sourdough seems to denature the gluten. In ways, this isn’t a big surprise. We, as a species, have been eating sourdough for 6,500 to 10,000 years with no celiac issues. We, as a species, eat factory bread for a few generations and suddenly bread makes people sick. A coincidence? I think not.
-Mike
Well said Mike, thanks!
It looks like all of their products don’t have sourdough listed.
Well I have heard of some bakeries using yeast to make “fake sourdough”. I remember eating what I suspect was a fake sourdough from the store.
The problem is more so the general population of bread lovers buying the breads won’t be able to tell as I find only a small amount of people seem to even know what yeast does let alone how sourdough cultures work.
People don’t read the ingredients so that is a great chance for them to pass this off as sourdough.
amazaing work, keep up the great website.
I was just a blog post http://kotybear.blogspot.com/2012/12/hostess-ho-ho-is-on-me.html I came upon your review and linked it so people could see what agreat bread I’m gonna get stuck with. Yikes! Now I’m really an unhappy camper!
Thanks so much for pointing this out. This is a criminally deceptive practice that could endanger people with Celiac’s disease who think that they are buying sourdough bread, rather than ersatz sourdough bread. We bought three loaves of this (Seattle “Sourdough”), and it was very obvious that this bread is not real sourdough.
It will not toast, either. Bread like this burns–it doesn’t toast. It is truly an ersatz bread in all respects especially in the sourdough realm, of which there is none. False advertising—apparently it is allowed. If this was a supplement, it would not be allowed.
You all are idiots. Seattle Sourdough is one of the best around. I don’t care if it has it in the ingredients or not it is still great bread. It is a top seller in Seattle so if you don’t like don’t buy it I am sure there are many of us out here that will buy it.
Not idiots, we just know what good sourdough tastes like. I was like you once Jennifer, so I know where you are coming from.
I challenge you to find out where we are coming from. Learn to bake your own sourdough and then come back here and tell us what you think. Contact me at northwestsourdough@gmail.com and I will send you a sourdough starter to get you started.
This is awesome. I was going to go directly to the westonaprice chapter people to find out about good sourdough and I found out about this. I was wondering if there was any good sourdough in Seattle made the real long fermented way and I was also wondering if the flour has to be home ground (too much for me if I made my own) or fermented even before starting or the grains sprouted. I think you know what I mean. Can I get it around here or should I try to make my own (obviously I have not attempted this yet? Any advice appreciated. Thank you.