Bread Pans - A question of size

[Anna N]

I have been on a bread-baking frenzy and have had some surprisingly good results BUT whenever a recipe calls for a 4 1/2 x 8 1/2 x 2 1/2 inch loaf pan, my bread always rises so far above the top of the pan that it becomes more crust than loaf.

This has happened on many occasions and with many different doughs. I have measured my pans over and over and they conform to the specs. What gives?

Thanks, as always, for your insight.

[rcaffelle]

When your bread is going through it's second rise, most recipes give an approximate time it should take, and the condition the dough should be in when ready to bake (over the edge of the pan). Now if you are waiting the specified time and the dough is ridiculously large, you're probably overproofing, maybe because it's too warm (one possible reason). Maybe you should try baking when the dough "looks" like it should when it's time to bake. Just over the top of the pan for instance. If your 2nd rise takes much shorter than the recipe indication (25 minutes instead of 75), you may have a yeast amount issue or temperature issue.

rich

[BettyK]

Assuming you're not overproofing, if you make the same bread twice and get the same result then use a bigger pan. Not sure if this will be of any help but If I'm baking my plain white loaf (3 2/3 cups bread flour) or whole wheat loaf (4 cups WW flour) I use a 10" X 5" X 3" pan. Works well for me.

[andiesenji]

I use a 10" X 5" X 3" pan. Works well for me.

All my "regular" loaf pans are 10 inch.

If all you have are the smaller pans, use only 2/3 of the dough you have been using.

[Anna N]

Thanks for all your replies. I do not think it is related to overproofiing - I've been doing bread for a while now and making lots of mistakes but I would expect the texture of overproofed bread to be the tell-tale sign.

When this does happen to me, I make a note on my recipe and the next time I use that recipe I use the larger size pan but it can be SO frustrating when it's a new recipe and the same things happens!

Further, I have never quite grasped why you would bake such a tiny loaf!

So, I guess from now on I will just automatically go the larger pan and disregard the recipe (except for sweet breads (non-yeast) where I understand the logic of the smaller loaf).

[Anna N]

This was annoying me so much that I decided an experiment was in order. I repeated the bread that caused the trouble the last time but I carefully weighed the dough and divided it (to the gram) into two equal portions. I baked one in the smaller 8x4 and one in the larger 9x5.

The larger loaf was much better shaped and had what I think is a reasonable ration of top crust to bread. The smaller one again overfilled the pan and is not at all well-shaped.

I think the solution is one offered earlier in this thread - 2/3 of the dough in the larger pan would result in a perfectly, at least to me, shapped loaf.

I will repeat the experiment when we have eaten this current batch.