A stay-at-home mom became an Instagram star when she discovered 'sourdough painting' and helped turn it into social media's latest wholesome craze

• Sourdough painting is becoming an increasingly popular trend on social media.
• The activity involves using food coloring or edible paint to draw designs on unbaked bread loaves. 
• One creator told Insider how she shot to viral fame by taking part in the trend. 

Throughout the various lockdowns of 2020, baking became one of America's most unexpected hobbies, which saw yeast and flour flying off of supermarket shelves for months on end. 

Sourdough recipes were among the most popular baking trends on social media at the time, with creators going viral for sharing their tips for producing sourdough starters (the live fermented culture used to make the bread) and baking their loaves to perfection. On TikTok, the hashtag #BreadTok was overflowing with sourdough-making videos, and the tag is still home to a large community of baking enthusiasts today, with over 2.8 billion views on the tag. 

In recent months, the sourdough trend has leveled up, as some creators have added a new ingredient to the mix: edible paint or food coloring, which they are using to create designs on the sourdough crust. 

Allison Loveall, a stay-at-home mom and Instagram creator based in Phoenix, Arizona, stumbled upon the concept of sourdough painting in late 2021, when she saw some other creators trying out designs on her Instagram feed, although their posts were not hugely viral at the time. 

Loveall, 26, decided that it could be entertaining to try sourdough painting and document it on her Instagram page, where she often posted images of her Christian-themed art. 

"It was a way I could combine my artistic skills with my hobby of baking. So I thought, why not give it a shot?" she said. 

It didn't take long for Loveall's flower-themed sourdough art to take off on Instagram, where one of her videos has now been viewed more than 20 million times. She told Insider that she's seen the hobby blow up and inspire countless users on the app in the span of just a few months.

Sourdough painting combines two already-viral concepts into a recipe for online fame 

Sourdough painting is quick, but not easy. After proving her dough in the fridge, Loveall tries to paint her designs, using edible gel paints, within 15 minutes so the loaf stays cold before going in the oven — all while trying to capture the perfect angle of the process for her videos on social media. 

Loveall told Insider that the appeal of the already-popular sourdough-making genre, combined with the aesthetically-pleasing element of applying paint, has viewers hooked on these videos. Many commenters say that watching Loveall's content makes them feel at peace, and other oddly satisfying artistic genres — such as adult coloring or color matching — have also grown in popularity in recent years because of their calming impact. 

The sourdough painting community appears to be growing rapidly, as more people have been trying the method for themselves on TikTok and Instagram over the past few months. Some creators who have been pioneering this trend for a few years, such as food blogger Mia Campbell, whose sourdough painting account @thewellth inspired Loveall's content, have seen an overall rise in views in this time as well. 

After stumbling across sourdough painting, Loveall made the hobby into her online niche 

When Loveall first joined the sourdough painting community, she imitated the methods of other creators she admired, using food coloring to draw designs on the loaf before baking it.

"It's so therapeutic," she wrote in the caption of her first post, from November 2022, where she drew green flowers on her sourdough. 

When Loveall's fifth sourdough painting post, posted in February 2023, went mega-viral on Instagram (even drawing the attention of model Gigi Hadid, who liked the video) she concluded that the huge attention she received was largely due to the fact that she adjusted her methodology, using edible gel paints instead of food coloring, which produced more vibrant results after she baked the bread. 

"Everybody is just amazed by how much it popped and showed up on the bread," she said, describing the visual effect of the paint. 

Since then, Loveall's videos have continued to accrue millions of views each, and she has become one of the most celebrated sourdough painting content creators, with 141,000 Instagram followers and 211,000 TikTok followers who continue to watch her baking content, although she used to primarily post faith-inspired art content, such as Bible journaling videos. 

"I'm very humbled by the power of social media," Loveall told Insider, looking back on how she skyrocketed into virality.

"The fact that a video I created in my home can be viewed over 18 million times is quite terrifying, but it's also extremely amazing because it's so cool to know you can create something you love, and if other people love it, then it can go viral and inspire millions," she said. 

For more stories like this, check out coverage from Insider's Digital Culture team here.