I tested 14 sourdoughs – M&S was tastier than Gail’s ...Middle East

Do you know your sourdough from your sliced white? We love morning toast and sandwiches at lunchtime and the cult bread sourdough, made with just flour, water and salt and a natural fermented ‘starter’ instead of yeast, is soaring in popularity. According to Tesco, sourdough accounted for one in every 13 bread products sold in the UK in the year to July 2025, while its own sales rose by 40 per cent on the previous 12 months.

Most sourdough loaves from artisan, independent bakers cost between £4 and £5, up to £7 or £8 in the capital. Today, all supermarkets offer their own versions. Most are cheaper than artisan loaves, but not by much. There’s a mix of white, wholemeal, rye and seeded breads on offer across all the major retailers. Some are sliced and packaged. Some are baked on-site.

It’s funny how a loaf of bread can be so controversial, but when it comes to sourdough, people argue over everything from the price to the method to whether it can be called sourdough at all.

I went to my favourite local bakery, Staple, to taste test a range of supermarket sourdoughs with founder and baker Stephen Gadd. For me, Gadd’s is the ideal sourdough: a springy, chewy crumb (this is what professionals call the inside of a loaf) that’s tasty and tangy thanks to the blend of four flours and a starter that’s fed twice a day, with a really crisp crust that shatters under the knife.

“Sourdough is so simple, but yet so complicated. It’s impressive when you think it’s just three ingredients,” he says. “It’s an ever-changing product. I don’t think you can commercialise or industrialise sourdough. I worked in food development for many years, and there are just some things you can’t do.”

Most of us eat bread because it’s delicious, easy, and a good value and filling food. But sourdough has hit a sweet spot in popularity in recent years because of its health credentials as well as how tasty it is. It’s made with the live cultures in the starter – and we now know that fermented foods are good for gut health. Real sourdough also contains no ultra-processed ingredients. Many of the additives and preservatives found in supermarket bread are said to cause all kinds of ill health.

Here, Gadd and I review supermarket sourdoughs and rank them from best to worst.

WINNER: M&S Collection Crafted White Sliced Sourdough

£4.25/400g (£10.60/kg)

“This is not too bad,” says Gadd. “It has the most sourdough-like texture of all of them, and there’s a bit of tang to it and it has a harder crust.” M&S says this loaf is “folded by hand at an award-winning bakery then baked on Italian marble to create the signature dark crust.” Contains corn grits and wheat flakes as well as a blend of flours, and malted barley – a flavour enhancer considered an ultra-processed ingredient. If you have access to an independent store, its bread is probably cheaper if you compare the price per kilo.

4/5

Waitrose No. 1 White Sliced Sourdough

£2.25/500g (£4.50/kg)

This one is ultra-processed ingredient free. There’s some springiness to these slices and a blend of Shipton Mill flours: white, rye, wholemeal rye and wholemeal wheat. Gadd finds it dry and criticises the lack of a decent crumb, but there’s some tanginess.

3.5/5

Waitrose No.1 Seeded Sliced Sourdough

£2.25/500g (£4.50/kg)

“The seeds give it some flavour and make it more interesting,” says Gadd. As well as wheat, rye, wholemeal and fermented wheat flour, this loaf includes sunflower and pumpkin seeds and linseed, oats, malted barley flour and malted barley – a flavour enhancer considered an ultra-processed ingredient.

3/5

Tesco Finest Seeded Sourdough loaf

£3.75/800g (£4.70/kg)

“That is terrible. That’s the worst one,” says Gadd. The ingredient list is certainly unusual for a sourdough. There’s a good proportion – 6 per cent – of mixed seeds, including chia, pumpkin, sunflower, linseeds and red quinoa, but also lentils, toasted chickpeas and tapioca starch. I don’t mind it toasted as it has a sweet and nutty flavour that’s a nice contrast to cheddar.

1/5

Tesco Finest Rye & Mixed Seed Sliced Sourdough

£1.95/400g (£4.70/kg)

“I don’t mind it,” says Gadd. “And there’s a lot going on flavour-wise. It’s got linseed, rye flour, millet seed, poppy seeds, though also rapeseed oil and molasses for some reason.”

2.5/5

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Sliced White Half Bloomer Sourdough

£1.95/400g (£4.90/kg)

Dense slices rather than the spring you’d hope for from a good loaf and a slightly sweet taste. There’s something of a chewy crust on it, but Gadd points out that the ingredient list includes rapeseed oil, as well as fermented wheat flour, which has come under fire as a way to smuggle additives or ultra-processed ingredients into supposed sourdough loaves without listing on the label.

2.5/5

Aldi Specially Selected White Sliced Sourdough

£1.75/500g (£3.50/kg)

This is the best value, simply because it’s the cheapest while tasting very similar to most of the other white sliced loaves. “The substance isn’t there,” says Gadd. “And there’s no lovely blistering.” Contains just wheat and rye flours with salt and water, along with the cheeky fermented wheat flour.

2.5/5

Gail’s Seeded Sourdough from ocado.com

£4.95/650g (£7.60/kg)

This is the second most expensive bread we try, but Gadd isn’t a fan and is very surprised to learn it’s from premium brand Gail’s. The crumb is very tight giving a dense and heavy loaf. The very generous (15 per cent) mix of seeds includes sesame which is unusual and welcome, along with rye, spelt and malted wheat flour, and added gluten. Appears to be ultra-processed ingredient free.

2/5

Waitrose No. 1 Wheat & Rye Sourdough

£2.25/500g (£4.50/kg)

Gadd finds this loaf really dry, even though I picked it up minutes before meeting him, but it’s one of the rare ultra-processed ingredient-free loaves I find, containing, like the Waitrose white sliced, a blend of Shipton Mill flours, salt, water and nothing else.

2/5

Ocado White Sliced Sourdough

£2.25/500g (£4.50/kg)

“There’s no real flavour to this one, or depth, it’s just texture,” says Gadd. That texture does give it a bit of a spring, though. Otherwise, it’s a very similar product to most of the white sliced I try. Includes rapeseed oil but is up front about the flour treatment agent, ascorbic acid, instead of hiding behind the “fermented wheat flour” fudge.

2/5

Celtic Bakers Organic White Sourdough from ocado.com

£2.80/500g (£5.60/kg)

Celtic Bakers, along with Bertinet Bakery, is one of two nationally available sourdoughs that are signed up to the Real Bread Loaf Mark scheme, a paid-for license with around 180 members. “The ingredients are better than others,” says Gadd. “But it’s dry, there’s no chewy texture and not a good crust.”

2/5

Jason’s Sourdough The Great White Sliced

£2.10/450g (£4.70/kg)

My daughter is always begging for white bread but she turns this down. “If you closed your eyes and ate that, you wouldn’t say it was sourdough,” says Gadd. “It melts in the mouth, but not in a good way, and smells sweet. There’s no crust on the bottom of it. Like a whole Hovis loaf, you can rip it up and squeeze it into a ball. Without the crust, which is where the flavour is, there’s no definition.”

1/5

Tesco Finest White Sliced Sourdough

£1.95/400g (£4.70/kg)

“This smells off – stale – and looks raw at the bottom,” says Gadd. “It’s not very nice.” He does praise the inclusion of rye flour in a white loaf, but points out the rapeseed oil, which shouldn’t be in a sourdough.

1/5

Tesco Finest White Sourdough loaf

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£3.75/800g (£4.70/kg)

Gadd points out that the crumb, the inside of the loaf, is too tight, meaning that the dough has been underproved and not left for long enough for the full fermentation process and the flavours to develop. “It’s badly made bread, and too dense and heavy.” He points out how half a loaf of his own bread is a similar size to the Tesco loaf, but comes in at almost half the weight. A blend of flours along with barley malt extract (considered an ultra-processed ingredient) and durum wheat semolina (minimally processed).

1/5

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