#sourdough

#sourdough

CopperLeaf Bakery and Wine Bar, a new cafe located at Frederick Douglass Boulevard and 114th Street in Harlem, is serving up sweet treats and hot drinks this winter. The business officially opened in December 2025, and their most loyal customers have been trudging through the January snow to get a taste of the eatery's pride and joy: their freshly baked sourdough bread. The cafe's drinks are a mixture of traditional and eccentric.

Malkin's operation, Fort Mill Sourdough, is one of a remarkable number of microbakeries proliferating across the United States, in big cities and small towns alike. Sky-high commercial rents and the impossible math of how to care for children while running a business have created the need for home-based bakeries. Flexible state licensing, digital tools and a hunger for sourdough -- which many consumers believe is healthier than mass-produced bread -- have created big opportunities for home bakers.

Whether you're a chronic starter-killer or the whole concept of making bread sans yeast sounds too complicated, you're in the right place. As someone who started and promptly ended her sourdough journey three times over before finally opening a microbakery, I've been in your shoes, and I know how frustrating the initial sourdough learning curve can be. Fortunately, making plentiful mistakes is the best way to learn what not to do in almost any given situation, sourdough included.

Sourdough bread is one of the oldest types of bread in existence that was consumed in ancient Egypt and Greece. It stuck around for centuries in Europe, and after French immigrants brought it to the city, it was a popular choice during the Gold Rush in San Francisco. From there it spread to Alaska and Canada. To cut a long story short, by the mid-20th century, mass-produced bread was taking off, leaving little room for sourdough. But now it's back.

So while you can make sourdough starter at home using flour and water, it is a bit of a process. It can take nearly a week to properly prepare, and you need to be careful about all those feeding times and temperatures. A much easier solution is to buy some starter, or get it from someone who already has one.

A lot of us experimented with sourdough over lockdown, those long weeks stuck indoors, allowing a prime opportunity to start a new life in your airing cupboard. It can be quite daunting to manage the mercurial nature of that ancient balance of wild yeast and bacteria. Beginning the process of making your own sourdough starter alone is challenging and unpredictable; the opportunity to do so with fellow beginners and a trained professional helps allay much of the mystery and stress.

Sophia Handschuh, also known as Sourdough Sophia, transitioned from baking bread at home to operating a pastel pink-fronted micro-bakery in Crouch End after positive local response.

Patrick and Linda's love blossomed over subsequent video calls during the pandemic, leading Duffy to profess his love after a simple 'goodbye'.