This Finnish Rye Bread, Ruisleipä, has been on my baking list for a while. What better time to share it than Real Bread Week — a global celebration of additive-free loaves.
Right now, bread lovers everywhere are posting their favourite bakes to promote real bread: encouraging home baking, supporting independent bakeries, and backing the Real Bread Campaign.
This loaf uses 100% dark rye flour — ideal for the ‘scalded flour’ method, common in Swedish baking too. There are plenty of reasons to use this approach when working with rye.
Scalding simply means mixing flour with near-boiling water and letting it sit at room temperature. This triggers changes that improve both flavour and texture. The heat activates amylase enzymes, abundant in wholegrain rye, which then break down starches into sugars as the mix cools. It also kills off unwanted bacteria and yeast, giving the bread a natural sweetness.
That’s the science done — now for the method…
This takes a little of your time over two days. On the first evening, make a loose leaven at 125% hydration.
Next, mix the dough – it takes about 20 minutes. Cover and leave it at room temperature overnight.
In the morning, add the leaven, salt and caraway to the dough. Work it in by squishing and twisting until smooth. It will be sticky, but don’t worry. Cover and rest for one hour.
To shape, dust your work surface with rye flour. Roll the dough into a round, leaving one side smooth. Place it smooth-side down into a floured, cloth-lined banneton. Dust the top with more flour.
Prove for 90–120 minutes, depending on your kitchen temperature. It’s ready to bake when cracks appear on the surface.
Finnish sourdough rye – Cracks have appeared indicating it’s ready to bake.
You can find a step-by-step video on how to makes this on my IGTV channel, click here.
This sourdough should be baked at a high temperature, for just under an hour. The idea is to have a deeply caramelised crust. Now for the bad news, this loaf shouldn’t be sliced for 24 hours, the crumb needs to set properly before devouring.
The perfect loaf with gravlax, however cheese comes a close second. Enjoy!
Find out how to make a starter here.
Finnish Sourdough Rye (Ruisleipä)
Ingredients
Loose leaven
- 120 g dark rye starter 100% hydration
- 180 g dark rye flour
- 225 g water
Dough
- 360 g dark rye flour
- 275 g water at 85°C
Day 2
- Loose leaven as above
- Autolysed dough as above
- 12 g fine sea salt
- 2 tsp caraway seeds or aniseed
Instructions
Day 1
- Begin the first stage just before you go to bed. Mix the rye starter with the dark rye flour and water to make the loose leaven. Cover and leave at room temperature overnight.
- Next place the flour for the dough in a large bowl. Boil the kettle and pour the required amount in a jug, with a thermometer, check the temperature, you’re aiming for 85°C. Now pour the water over the flour. Stir immediately with a spoon until you have a lumpy looking mixture. Remove the spoon, then bring together with your hand. If you find the dough too hot to handle, you can mix the dough in a free standing mixer. Once the dough is formed, cover and leave at room temperature overnight with the loose leaven.
Day 2
- First thing the following morning: begin with adding a couple of tablespoons of the leaven to the dough, squeezing, pushing your hand in and twisting. Once that is incorporated add more leaven, repeating the technique mentioned previously. Next add the salt and caraway, sprinkling evenly across the dough and again repeating the technique to incorporate. Repeat with the remaining leaven. You should have a fairly soft, sticky dough. Cover and leave to rest for 1 hour.
- Once the dough has rested, have ready a round banneton basket ready, lined with a muslin cloth heavily dusted with rye flour. Dust the work surface with rye flour, then turn the dough out. Roll and shape into a round, ensuring the under side is smooth. Place the smooth side down in the banneton. Press down, then dust with rye flour. No need to cover.
- Oven 235°C fan.
- Prove for 90-120 minutes (depending on the temperature in your kitchen) or until cracks appear on the surface of the dough.
- Pre-heat the oven for at least half an hour before baking the bread. If you have a cloche or casserole pot, put it in as you turn the oven on.
- When you’re ready to bake, turn the dough out onto a piece of baking parchment. Dust with a little more rye flour and leave for 10–15 minutes to allow the dough to settle; you’ll notice a few cracks appearing. No scoring is required — the beauty of this bread lies in its natural cracks. Place it in the hot cloche or pot and bake for 35 minutes. Remove the lid and continue baking for a further 12–15 minutes. The crust should be very dark. Cool on a wire rack. The bad news is that the bread shouldn’t be sliced for 24 hours — the crumb needs time to set… sorry!
Tips:
- You don’t need to own a banneton basket to prove this dough. Just use a colander lined with a thin tea towel instead.
Raw Blueberry Bites
May I know that Dark Rye Starter is the same as Sourdough starter?
Hello Mandy,
Yes it’s the same, obviously I only use dark rye flour not white. You can easily convert some of your starter by taking a tablespoon of your starter and adding equal quantities of rye and water and leaving it to grow. Discard and repeat. Hope that helps.
Thanks for your responsed….. May I know if I could just use my white rye starter in Dark Rye Bread?
I have never used a white starter for this loaf but I cannot see why it wouldn’t work. Add dark rye with your white starter to the pre-ferment, and proceed as I have from there.
By sticky, wet dough, do you mean thick, dough like paste? I just added my starter, salt, seeds, I wouldn’t all the texture a dough that I’m familiar with. Hoping I’m just not familiar rather than I over hydrated.
Hi Rebecca, it is quite sticky yes. I’m not sure whether you use Instagram but I have a video of me making Ruisleipä. Just head to my account and click on the triangle on my profile page. I hope that helps.
I’m torn on this formula. My loaf was sunken and gummy in the middle, even though I temped it to 200, and the crust was slightly burned. The taste of the 4 crust sides I cut off were outstanding.
I’ll give it one more try, with a little less water, lower temp and longer bake.
Hi Rebecca, I’m trying to figure out what could have gone wrong here. Firstly I assume you have followed the recipe exactly? The crust is meant to be dark and quite caramelised however all ovens do vary.
Hello,
I’m planning on making this bread for my mom, whose finnish but living in the states. I am a new baker and would like to watch your blog archived video but really having difficulty finding it. When I select the link it takes me to a different page. Would you be able to assist me with where to watch the process of adding the leaven to the dough? Thank you so much.
Stef
Hi Stephanie, I hope you found the video, let me know if you haven’t.
Hi! I tried this wonderful bread and it is gorgeous 🙂 thanks for a great recipe
The bread looks like your photo except I didn’ get a just as dark colour so I was wondering what is dark and white rye? I only know one kind of rye and this flour is not very dark but also not white-looking
Does dark rye have some malt in it? I live in denmark so maybe the selection is different
🙂
Hi Ursula, I’m glad the bread was a success. We in the UK call wholegrain rye – Dark rye and Light rye has had some of the wholegrain removed.Neither contains malt. My oven runs quite hot, so maybe try baking the loaf at a higher temperature for 5-8 minutes at the end of baking. I hope this helps.
Hi,
Wondering about the hydration. I’ve made this bread about four times now. Each time the taste is just great, but I’m having trouble with the dough being so we that I can’t really shape it. It looks more wet than yours in your video. No matter how much I dust the muslin in the basket, dough sticks to the muslin. — I started with 225g of water in the levain and now am down to 205gms. Wondering if you have any thoughts. — By the way, just tried making your Seeded crackers, and we all are wondering if this isn’t the best bread we ever ate! Thanks.
Hi Tom,
Mmm, puzzling. I take it you are using wholegrain rye flour? The only thing I can think of is that the milling of the flour might be different where you are and then affects the absorption of water. I’m sorry I cannot be of more help to you.
Delighted to here the seeded crackers were a success :-))
Your recipe is one that I want to try TODAY! But…. we got a small problem. You see over here in America our measuring system is a bit different than yours. As I noticed all your measurements are in grams I assume they are different for liquid and dry measurements?
You wouldn’t have U.S. measurements by any chance would you?
I tried looking on Amazon for measuring cups and spoons and didn’t find anything but if you know one that will work let me know and I’ll get them.
Sorry for the trouble but I really really like this bread!
JOhn
Hi John,
I am aware you use measuring cups in The US and I’m afraid I don’t use them. I always weigh flour and liquid when I bake for accuracy. If you’re able to obtain a set of scales, I would highly recommend doing so. I’m certain there will be conversion tables available online if you don’t want to invest in scales. Hope this helps.
Wow! I have just moved to Finland, and I’m excited to try baking the traditional rye bread. I feel lucky for having found your recipe, looks great. I still have to prepare a new starter, so I will try to adapt the recipe to bake with instant yeast while the starter gets going. Thank you so much for sharing!
My pleasure Flora. Let me know what you think.
My first loaf just went in the oven. Smells incredible and it could not have been easier to make. I even found a traditional Finnish rye at the Finnish store here in New Zealand. Not sure I will manage the 24 hour stand down period though. That might prove the most difficult part of the process! Thank you for the recipe!
Thanks for the lovely comment Emma. Hope you enjoyed the bread…after 24 hours 😉
My grandmother (and my aunts as well) used to make this bread all the time. And no way could we wait the 24 hours. Us kids ate it soon as it came out of the oven, hot with butter (but not so hot as to burn us) and it was one of the best experiences of my life.
One of life’s little pleasures :-))
This bread is easy to make and tastes simply fantastic. I’ve made it more than ten times and is my favourite recipe for rye bread.
Thank you!
Natasha, so great to hear. Thanks for taking the time to comment.
Thank you for a fantastic – and well explained – recipe. Great result.
Great to hear Sophie! Thanks for taking the time to comment :-))
great recipe. though I remember a lot of the Finnish rye breads not using the Caraway seeds. Personally I preferred it without, but it was very reminiscent of the bread from Finland.
Glad you like the recipe and obviously easy to omit the caraway if preferred. Thanks for taking the time to comment Sam.