Pan de Mie Wilton Pullman Pan High Altitude
Someone brought me a 16x4x4 1/2 inch Wilton Pullman style aluminum pan, which I'm grateful for as a pullman pan costs over $100 here.
My greatest concern is the yeast. Tardi-Pan, which is a Mexican brand. The good news is that Tardi-Pan IS a SAFMEX product, which makes SAF Instant Yeast. Although Tardi-Pan is an instant yeast, I don't know which catagory of SAF Instant it falls into, there are a variances in each color. I used an white pastry flour and added the Tardi-Pan yeast dry to the mixture. The dough responded nicely and came out nicely in the pan while baking it at 435 degrees F for only 30 min on the midddle rack in an electric oven. We are at 5000 feet. I'm wondering if I should have baked the loaf on the lowest rake as it was a little brown on top? My heart break came when it came time to take the bread out of the pan. I slide a thin metal spatuala along the sides and for the most part, the bread slid out, but a piece came off of one corner end. Why does it stick to the pan & how can I prevent it from happening again w/out greasing the pan? The loaf is cooling on it's side, crust is hard and due to the broken piece I can tell the inside is soft. I'm wanting to cool the loaf, wrap it and let it do it's thing in the fridge for a couple of days Julia Child style before cutting into it. Appreciate any help.
If anyone knows how I should be working with the Tardi-Pan Instant yeast, whether the loaf should bake on a lower rake will prevent browning so much on top, and how to keep the loaf from sticking and breaking off while sliding it out of the pan?
Perhaps you can describe your recipe in a little more detail. For example, if your recipe uses milk or sugar, it will brown more quickly during the bake.
If what you described happened to my loaf, the first thing I would try is to lower the oven temperature. I don't have experience baking at altitude, so hopefully others can address that aspect (you can also search for that topic and you will likely find some discussions). But if it browns too quickly, my reaction is that it is in too hot an oven. I doubt very much that the yeast has anything to do with it. It may have something to do with whether you are using convection setting or not. As an aside, when I use a Pullman pan, I will generally use a light coat of spray oil followed by a dusting of flour in the pan, and I don't experience sticking problems, but you said you didn't want to grease the pan.
As for storage, according to Harold McGee, storing breads in a refrigerator tends to stale them faster. If you don't want to keep a loaf at room temperature, you can wrap it in aluminum foil, place it in a ziploc bag and freeze it.
-Brad
I used Julia Child's Pan de Mie recipe, doubled. But rather than adding water to dissovle the yeast, I used an instant yeast that didn't need it, so I added extra milk in it's place. We're suppose to add 20 degrees being high altitude. In a convection over reduce 20 degrees. I used regular baking heat.
here's the ingredients for 1 batch w/my changes:
2 tsp instant yeast plus I added another 1/4 milk at 110 degrees as I didn't dissolve the yeast before adding to the dry mixture.
1 1/3 cup whole milk 110 degrees
3 1.2 c all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp sea salt
4 tbs cold unsalted butter
Julia Child recommends wrapping the loaf in plastic and letting it set up for 2 days before slicing, she says it's easier to slice and the flavors set in better...it really does work as there have been times we couldn't wait! It lasts forever in the fridge. Not really but over a week.
If the loaf is cooked completely and isn't dried out in the middle, then I guess the browning is expected based on the milk content. If you are unhappy with it, then experiment with different temperatures.
BTW, if the recipe called for active dry yeast and you are using instant, then it's probably not necessary to heat the milk to 110˚. Room temperature would do.
hmm, interesting about the milk. Well, I lightly brushed the pan for my whole wheat oatmeal and honey loaf with some virgin coconut oil and lightly floured it...it turned out like a dream! I was so afraid it'd stuck to the bottom that I gave it a big shake & it did fall out...the bread was hot and it cracked the crust at little as it fell. That was because of my mishandle or should it have not cracked? I'm thinking it was my abuse. :)
Be careful about admiting to loaf abuse on TFL ;-)
Glad it worked out.