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Dropped $38 on a pullman loaf pan for my sandwich bread, and I still can't decide if it was worth it
I bake sandwich bread most Sundays, and my loaves always came out with this domed top that made ugly triangles for my kid's lunch. So I bought a pullman pan with the sliding lid for about $38 at a local shop here in Dayton, and the first bake gave me this perfect square loaf that sliced like store bread. But the lid traps steam and the crust comes out soft and pale, and honestly some mornings I miss that golden crackly top. My sister says the square slices are worth every penny, my buddy who bakes sourdough says I ruined a good loaf with a lid. So which is it, is a pullman a real upgrade or just a gimmick for people who hate crust?
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andrew69321d ago
Went through this exact thing two years ago when my wife got tired of lopsided pb&j sandwiches. What finally settled it for me was splitting the batch, bake one loaf in the pullman and one in my old pan, then freeze the square one for the week. Kid gets her neat slices, I still get my crackly top on the weekend loaf, everybody wins. Word of warning though, that lid squashes the rise hard, so I had to bump my dough up by about 15 percent or the corners came out pinched and sad. Also let the loaf sit in the pan ten minutes before you slide the lid off and flip it, otherwise the steam makes the bottom gummy. Your buddy is not wrong that a lid changes the crust, but he is wrong that it ruins anything, it just makes a different bread. A pullman is a tool for a job, and if that job is lunchbox slices, it does it better than anything else in my kitchen.
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kelly.robin21d ago
Ha, so the real fix here is just baking two loaves and freezing one? That feels like the bread version of buying a second fridge so you don't have to clean the first one. @andrew693 makes a good point about the crust though, a lid really does change the whole game, and yeah the dough needs that extra bump or you get those sad pinched corners. The ten minute wait thing is real too, I rushed it once and got a gummy bottom that no amount of toasting could save. A pullman is just a tool for a job, and if the job is neat sandwich slices for a kid, then who cares if the top is soft and square. Sounds like everybody in your house wins and that is what counts.
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