How to recognise fresh bread
What to check before you buy bread — crust, weight, smell and crumb — to know it's genuinely fresh.
Not every loaf that looks good on the counter is equally fresh, and the difference isn’t always visible at a glance. Here’s what we pay attention to when judging bread ourselves — signs you can check with your hands, your eyes and your ears before you buy.
What the crust and weight tell you
The first thing we do is pick the bread up. A fresh sourdough loaf, like our White Sourdough or Whole Wheat Sourdough, feels lighter than it looks for its size — a sign that the crumb inside is airy rather than dense. A crust that’s genuinely fresh gives a light, crisp sound when you press it or tap it with a knuckle, instead of sounding dull or feeling rubbery soft. Colour tells its own story too: a deep, uneven colour means a long bake, while a pale, flat surface usually means a faster one.
What the crumb tells you once it’s cut
When you cut into a sourdough loaf, look inside. Uneven holes of different sizes, scattered loosely through the crumb, are a sign that the dough had enough time to develop naturally. A crumb that’s too dense and uniform, without those holes, usually means a shorter fermentation. The smell from a fresh cut should be mild, slightly tangy and fresh — not stale, not sharp, not flat and characterless.
Differences between types of bread
Not every loaf is judged the same way. Baguette and Ciabatta have a thinner crust and are best on baking day — if the crust has already gone soft instead of crisp, the loaf has passed that window. Focaccia is checked differently: the surface should be moist with olive oil, not dried out and hard. Bread made from other flours, like Buckwheat, Spelt or Rye, has a naturally denser structure, so weight and smell matter more than the crumb’s holes themselves.
When in doubt
If you don’t have a loaf on hand to compare, the best guide is the combination: a weight that surprises you with how light it is, a crust that crackles, and a smell that reads as fresh right away. Any one of these on its own can mislead, but together they give a pretty clear picture.
Stop by our shops on Aerodrom or at Kapistec Petit, pick up a loaf before you buy it, and ask the team to show you in person what to look for.