Battle of the vintage minis

Over the years I have become quite fond of my little 1-pound bread machine. It never fails to deliver a really good loaf of bread! And for a single person, that size loaf is just about right; it almost always gets eaten before it starts to turn funky. My go-to mini has been the Panasonic SD-BT56P.

Over the weekend, life gifted me with another mini; a Zojirushi BB-HAC10. Like the BT56P, it has a nice, heavy cast-aluminum breadpan, a feature which I really like. I've posted comparisons of the full-size Zoji and Pan machines before; let's see how these light-weights compare.

I used the recipe I bake the most in the BT56P, a evolved/evolving white bread with CLAS, 20% whole wheat, and a 12-hour preferment. Here's the recipe:

12 hr room-temp preferment:
  170g Valencia Mills AP (locally milled, ~11.5% protein)
  63g home-milled whole wheat
  54g yogurt whey
  107g H2O
  0.1g SAF IDY
  12g CLAS

Dough: preferment, plus
   83g AP
   1/2 teaspoon salt
   25g H2O
   25g CLAS

The timing of the Basic cycles for both machines are amazingly similar, so I used the same process for both machines; no changes were needed.

Both machines start their cycle with a "rest" period (to bring the ingredients to room temperature). You can count that period as the end of the preferment, or not, 20-30 minutes doesn't make any difference in a 12-hour process.

Most machines with small breadpans do a decent job of mixing and kneading.  Such was the case here, though the BT56P does a bit better job developing the dough.

After the knead, the pan is lifted and placed in the chamber so that the mixing paddle is disengaged from the motor spindle. We'll skip the first "stir" and then replace it.

After the second "stir", the paddle and dough are removed from the pan. Shape the dough, place back into the pan, and then into the baking chamber.

BTW, that is not a typo; only 1/10th of a gram of yeast was used. Up here at 6900 feet altitude, bread practically levitates and floats away unless you hold it down!

Rise and proofing temps and times were nearly identical.

Baking times/temps are a little different. The HAC10 bakes for 50 minutes at 309º. The BT56P bakes for 45 minutes at 340º.

Here are the results.

The crumb of both loafs are comparably good (thanks to CLAS).

As you can see, crust browning is better and much more uniform over the whole loaf with the BT56P. Typical for Zo's, the HAC10 upper crust is barely browned.

Taste-wise, the HAC10 is noticeably milder. Lost are the complex flavors brought by the whey and CLAS.

These results are the same as every other comparison I've done between comparable Zojirushi and Panasonic machines. The Pans simply make better bread. Especially in the baking department.

Cheers.