Can You Freeze Artisan Bread?

3 minutes

Nowadays, you’re not restricted to white and brown bread. There are endless options. But, can these artisan bread loaves be treated just like a traditional loaf?

How to Freeze Artisan Bread

Freezing artisan bread isn’t that tricky. In fact, bread should generally be frozen if you’re keeping it around for more than a few days – it helps to maintain the freshness.

Here’s the method we find works best:

1. Cool: Allow the loaf of artisan bread to cool, as wrapping it up beforehand will lead to condensation and textural damage. This might be a little less important if you haven’t made the bread yourself, but it’s still worth considering if you bought it from a bakery recently.
2. Slice: Slice the loaf of bread into however many slices you’d like, and make sure to keep the slices together, pressed against one another.
3. Wrap: Wrap the whole, sliced loaf in cling film, tightly, and ensure that any air bubbles around the loaf are entirely removed. This should make sure that as little freezer burn as possible sets in.
4. Freeze: Freeze the artisan bread in the centre of your freezer, where it will be as far as possible from the frost fronts at the edge of your freezer.

3 Tips for Freezing Artisan Bread

Now you know how to freeze it, we’ve got our 3 top tips which we strongly recommend following when freezing artisan bread to have the best results:

Check That Seal
Ensuring that you form a good seal with the cling film will help your bread to stay in great shape for as long as possible. Make sure that not only do you form a seal, but you smooth the film over the surface of the bread.

Use Your Toaster
Most modern toasters have a defrost function, and it’s wise to take advantage of it! When you pull a slice out of your freezer, run it through the toaster on defrost mode before you make a sandwich.

Bake to Freeze
If you like to cook in advance and have plenty of things ready to go, you could always bake a loaf or two of bread and then slice, wrap, and freeze them before ever needing to use them. That is a great way to ensure plenty of food in the house, should you need it. 

How Long Can You Freeze Artisan Bread?

You can freeze artisan bread for around 2 months before it loses any level of texture or flavour.

Typically, you’ll see this taking place as the bread gets a little more moist since it’s being stored in a humid environment.

However, if you use the defrost setting of your toaster, it can help to coax the moisture out, leading to a much better final piece of bread.

How Do You Defrost Artisan Bread?

You can easily defrost artisan bread through the use of your toaster, by simply placing the slices in and using the defrost setting.

However, you could also place the loaf in the kitchen, on the countertop for a few hours – that would likely make sure that your bread comes to room temperature quickly, and you can avoid soggy bread by keeping the cling film sealed until you’re ready to munch!

Can You Refreeze Artisan Bread?

Yes, you can refreeze artisan bread – refreezing bread is safe because it is extremely unlikely to develop any levels of dangerous bacteria, as milk, fish, or meat are liable to.

However, repeated freezing will likely damage the bread you’re using, ruining the texture. To ensure that this doesn’t happen, make sure only to thaw what you’re planning on using.

Does Artisan Bread Freeze Well?

Yes, artisan bread does freeze well.

All bread freezes quite well because toasters and similar appliances are good at removing the moisture that these items acquire during their stay in the freezer.

Related FAQs

If you’ve still got questions about freezing artisan bread or bread in general, then these may help: