Description
The Sourdough School — signed by Dr Vanessa Kimbell, with a personal book plate.
The groundbreaking book that put bread and the gut microbiome on the same page for the first time.
First published in 2018, The Sourdough School was the first English-language baking book to teach sourdough as a tool for human health — explaining how slow fermentation increases the bioavailability of nutrients, reduces certain fermentable carbohydrates, and supports people living with IBS. Seven years of research, over 300 academic studies, with the nutrition and digestion chapter validated over twelve months by Dr Amrita Vijay (PhD in digestion, King’s College London). The Sourdough School’s Digestion & Nutrition of Bread course, which sits alongside this book, is accredited by the Royal College of General Practitioners.
It is also the book that gave English-speaking bakers the technique behind the open, hole-filled crumb everyone is chasing: bassinage, the French method of holding back a portion of the water and adding it gradually once the gluten has formed. Vanessa used the French name because that was the only one she knew. The word entered the English baking lexicon from this book.
Inside: how to build a starter from scratch, then the formulas in order of difficulty from a basic loaf through porridge loaves to baguettes; how to control flavour, sourness and acidity by manipulating homo- and heterofermentative bacteria; how to use polyphenols and grain diversity (including her signature black barley) for gut health; sections on sprouted grains and smoking grains for flavour; both ambient French and timed San Francisco baking schedules; and Vanessa’s sourdough loaf record forms — the interactive bible bakers fill in to track and personalise their loaves.
Eight years on, this is still the textbook used on the three-day retreats at The Sourdough School. The school itself was named in the top three courses in the UK by The Times, and in the top ten by The Telegraph and Evening Standard. Vanessa is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s Food Programme and is category leader of the home bakers sourdough section of the World Bread Awards. This book founded the field of Nutrition and Digestion of Bread.
“Master the art of sourdough with Vanessa and you will learn how to look after your own gut microbes and health.” — Tim Spector, author of The Diet Myth
“Vanessa won’t just teach you to make sourdough bread; she will blow you away with how you can incorporate it into your everyday baking.” — Dan Lepard
Foreword by Richard Hart of Hart Bageri (Copenhagen) and Green Rhino (Mexico City), formerly head baker at Tartine, who has worked alongside Vanessa across France, Italy, Denmark and the United States.
Vanessa signs each book plate herself. We tuck it loose inside the book for you to fix in.
Cost includes UK shipping. If you are outside the UK, please get in touch and we will calculate postage for your country.
Vanessa runs www.sourdough.co.uk and www.thesourdoughclub.com
