Sourdough explained: What's behind the trend and how to scale your production output
Sourdough demand has been on the rise, with a boom since the pandemic, prompting producers to take note. Industrial production of sourdough poses obstacles for bakers seeking to meet rising demand. Check out our article and discover how producers are navigating this popular product while avoiding the difficulties of scaling production.
What is sourdough, and why is it on the rise?
Sourdough exploded in popularity during the pandemic and has shown staying power. Its complex flavor makes it a staple for sandwiches, toast, and other baked goods. The bread's sustained demand reflects both taste and perceived health benefits, creating opportunities and challenges for producers. According to a 2025 Puratos article, global conversations about sourdough are up 79% year over year.
Sourdough’s popularity is driven by improved digestibility, lower sugar stress, a premium artisanal taste, and appeal to clean-label consumers seeking simple ingredients.
The market is predicted to continue to grow well into the future. It is expected to expand from $279.6 million dollars to $438.4 million by 2035. This growth is prompting many companies to enter the market to meet rising consumer demand.
What gives sourdough its sourness?
Sourdough’s signature tanginess or sourness, the taste that gives it its name, comes from compounds produced during fermentation. The two main acids responsible are lactic acid, which is mild and yogurt-like, and acetic acid, which is piercing and vinegary. Fermentation time and temperature affect these.
A slower, cold fermentation — called cold proofing, in which dough is left to rise in the refrigerator — produces more acetic acid and thus a stronger sourness. Warmer fermentation produces more lactic acid, for a milder, yogurt-like taste.
Producing sourdough at an industrial level and its challenges
Sourdough is produced much differently from regular bread. It all starts with yeast: instead of commercial yeast, which is used for a quick rise, a gentle flavor, and a softer crust, sourdough uses a starter. A starter is a mixture of wild yeast and bacteria. When combined with water and flour, it ferments, providing natural leavening for the bread. This results in a thicker, crisper crust and chewier interior.
This is easier for a small bakery, which feeds the starter, grows it, and takes what it needs for the batch, but going from 10 loaves a day to 10,000 is a different animal altogether. In industrial production, where scale is large and consistency is required, more efficient production methods are necessary.
What manufacturers do to ensure efficiency and quality
Firstly, manufacturers use a controlled starter instead of relying on a wild starter. These are standardized, high-activity, pre-fermented, or frozen sourdough starters that preserve the usual flavor and provide consistent acidification across large batches. This protects the taste and consistency that customers expect from brands.
With the starter figured out, they move into fermentation, which can be wildly unpredictable in uncontrolled environments.
For this step, automated fermentation tanks are used. They are timed and monitor factors such as temperature and pH while fermenting. This step can be a bottleneck in production as the line stops running until the next batch is fermented, which can take many hours, depending on the recipe and external factors. To remedy this, producers will seed the next batch with 10% of the previous batch. This way, they don't have to pause production and can use continuous production methods.
Ensuring consistency while balancing efficiency is key in production. Awareness of the challenges of high-hydration doughs and how to address them will make for a successful product.
The core issue in sourdough-baked goods production
Now, with fermentation complete, we move into one of the trickiest parts of the production, dough handling. The difficulty lies in the dough itself, which is very sticky due to its high hydration, exceeding 75%, which can cause sticking. It is flexible but easily damaged, resulting in a deformed product, and is hard to shape or mold.
This is where lines not designed for this will fail, slow down, and completely halt production. To handle sticky dough, equipment for extrusion and shaping must be up to the task, made with materials and systems that will minimize stress and sticking.
For this reason, RONDO engineered the MIDOS System to extrude this difficult dough, using specialized materials for the inner walls and rollers. This allows for extrusion without the need for flour or oil, protecting flavor.
Molding can be done with our RONDObot, which perfectly shapes and rounds the bread without destroying its delicate structure. With equipment and continuous production, volume increases dramatically. This maximizes production efficiency. Automated equipment will save time, money, and labor input across the process.
Without suitable equipment, you will face issues such as sticking to belts and rollers, excessive dusting with flour or oil, ruining the taste, damaging the dough's structure during handling, and irregular scaling and shaping. As a result, you will have an inconsistent product, increased waste, and reduced efficiency.
Health benefits and clean label
Sourdough is a healthy alternative to white bread, offering health benefits beyond taste. Its fermentation breaks down gluten and phytic acid, releasing minerals. This makes it easier to digest and more nutritious. Sourdough also causes a slower rise in blood sugar, helping to avoid spikes that can lead to tiredness or irritability.
Most importantly, its unique flavor surpasses that of white bread, making it ideal for enhancing other flavors or adding a refreshing touch to dishes.
Additionally, sourdough can meet the requirements of being a clean-label product. The Clean Label Trend is founded on minimizing the amount of artificial ingredients and additives in products. Sourdough is already a simple product made with very few ingredients.
How can sourdough be used in different baked goods?
Sourdough is versatile and goes beyond bread. Use it for biscuits, crackers, pizza crust, pretzels, muffins, and donuts. It adds a tangy twist to these classics.
If you're interested in producing sourdough bread products or have questions about scaling up your bread production, reach out to RONDO. Scaling production requires more than equipment; it requires industry knowledge to offer solutions tailored to you. That’s where Dough-how makes the difference.
If you would like to test out your own recipe on our machines, you can make an appointment to visit our Dough-how Center here. Our page on bread will tell you more about the options you have when making bread.
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