Sourdough Ciabatta Rolls

These sourdough ciabatta rolls are light, airy, versatile and addictive. They’re perfect slathered in butter, for dipping and of course sandwiches.

Fourth time’s a charm? For sourdough ciabatta it is, at least the way I managed my experiments. Beginner’s luck, a first batch of nearly perfect ciabatta deceived me into thinking the process ran along the easy side of the difficulty scale. And it is…once I figured out the method that works best for achieving a powdery, thin golden crust and a light, airy crumb, hallmarks of a good ciabatta.

What is Ciabatta?

Originating in Italy and named “slipper” because of its elongated flat shape (a traditional ciabatta is long and rectangular), ciabatta is a yeasted white bread, developed by a Venetian baker in the 1980s and is a popular option for sandwiches, particularly panini. The recipe I share here uses my sourdough (wild yeast) starter instead of commercial yeast and rather than the traditional slipper shape, I’ve made single-serving rolls.

After years focusing on boules or batards, round and oval rustic loaves which I baked in a Dutch oven I’ve recently decided to broaden my sourdough horizons–mainly because I’ve finally upgraded from a 20-year old small, round pizza stone to a larger, rectangular, bread-friendly one–by venturing into baguettes and ciabattas which call for a different shaping technique than I’ve been used to and open baking (no covered baking vessel). Of the two, ciabatta requires less shaping know-how but ciabatta presented its own challenges.

How to Make Sourdough Ciabatta

I initially dismissed ciabatta as being easy because the process doesn’t call for skill in shaping dough. There’s no scoring involved so it seemed much less challenging than my baguette attempts. What ciabatta does call for are high-hydration dough and delicate handling.

High-Hydration Dough: Bread dough that contains 80% or more water as a percentage of the total flour in the recipe is considered high-hydration dough. This can be a challenge for less experienced bread bakers because the dough tends to be sticky and harder to manage during the early stages of fermentation but it’s part of what helps to get a light-airy crumb, combined with proper fermentation.

If you’ve tried my other sourdough recipes in this blog this one won’t be much different. My go-to hydration is usually 80%; I just bumped it up slightly for ciabatta to 87%. During the bulk fermentation stage the dough gains structure and becomes less sticky so the process is not as daunting as it may sound.

Delicate Handling of the Dough: One thing I like about the ciabatta process is that, unlike a baguette, it doesn’t require any shaping skill or experience. The dough is fermented, divided and left to proof a final time before it’s baked. The trick is in preserving the air bubbles produced during fermentation and final proof because that’s what will give you a ciabatta full of air bubbles. This means handling the dough as little as possible.

The Ciabatta Dough: This recipe for ciabatta dough is the same as for my other basic sourdough loaves. Traditionally, all white flour is used for ciabatta but it I like to mix in at least a small percentage of whole grain flour in my bakes for more flavor. For the batch of ciabatta rolls pictured here, my dough contained roughly 10% whole rye flour and it didn’t hurt the crumb. Feel free to use all white flour if that is what you prefer or mix in a small percentage of rye or whole wheat flour like I’ve done here.

The Ciabatta Process: The mixing and fermentation process is also the same as for other sourdough breads. My best tip here is to not allow the dough to rise fully during bulk fermentation because ciabatta dough benefits from a final rise after it’s been divided. I suggest a 50% rise (instead of allowing it to double) then refrigerating the dough overnight before dividing, final proof and baking the next day.

The recipe below calls for an autolyse period, adding the salt and starter in stages rather than mixing the dough all at once. This is not necessary–most times I mix the flour, water, starter and salt all at once–but I found the extra steps to be helpful in this recipe.

Oil or No Oil? Traditional ciabatta recipes don’t include fat, just flour, water, yeast and salt. I added oil to my early bakes and found omitting the olive oil helped me get a better crumb.

The Equipment: (All of these items are optional but I explain why I like them.)

1. Bread Couche: This is not necessary but it helps. A bread couche is a heavy duty, stiff linen fabric used for baguettes but it comes in handy for ciabatta too. Allowing the ciabatta dough to final proof in a couche helps to keep their shape.
2. Parchment Paper: Alternatively or along with a couche, parchment paper makes transferring ciabatta dough to the oven much easier. Instead of a couche, lay each of the divided pieces of ciabatta dough on a piece of parchment paper during the final proof or before transferring them dough to the oven. During final proof just cover the dough with a kitchen towel.
3. Baking Stone vs Baking Sheet: A ceramic baking stone (or baking steel) is not necessary but I did get better results compared to using a baking sheet. If you don’t have a baking stone don’t worry about it. You might just get a darker, thicker bottom crust using a regular baking sheet but your ciabatta will still be very nice.
4. Lava Rocks: I’m new to open baking but in the short time I’ve used a ceramic stone to bake sourdough bread, I’ve found lava rocks quite helpful. The presence of steam in the early stage of baking helps with oven spring and delays the formation of a crust. You can incorporate steam by just pouring hot water in a pan while you bake your bread but lava rocks help to generate and maintain steam in the oven.

Final Note: Don’t be intimidated by ciabatta. Even my bakes that didn’t produce the lightest, airiest crumb still made very good bread. We’ve been enjoying lots of sandwiches and have made delicious croutons out of the leftovers. Your bakes won’t go to waste but I bet you’ll enjoy the process.