Best Pullman loaf pan

A Pullman pan is a straight-sided loaf tin with a lid that slides across the top. Bake with the lid on and the dough cannot rise into a dome, so you get a rectangular loaf with square corners, a tight even crumb and a thin soft crust — pain de mie, shokupan, the sandwich bread shape.

It is worth saying plainly that this is close to the opposite of what most sourdough baking chases. An open, irregular crumb and a thick blistered crust are what a Dutch oven is for. A Pullman pan is for the loaf you actually want to put in a toaster or build a sandwich from, and sourdough makes an excellent version of that bread. They are two different goals and one does not replace the other.

Dough weight is the whole game

Almost every Pullman problem is a volume problem. The pan is a closed box: the dough has nowhere to go but into the corners and up against the lid, so the amount you put in decides whether it works.

• Too little dough and the loaf never reaches the lid. You get a short loaf with a flat top and an air gap, and the slices are stubby.
• Too much dough and the rising loaf pushes against a lid that will not move. It forces dough out through the lid slot and the pan seams, the crumb compresses, and the lid can be genuinely hard to slide off afterwards.

The frustrating part is that most manufacturers do not publish a dough capacity. Of the pans here, the two that do — both 13-inch models — each state 2.2 lb (about 1 kg) of dough. That is a useful anchor for a 13 x 4 x 4 pan. For other sizes you are scaling by volume, and the first bake is a calibration bake.

How we judged these

1. Whether the lid is included. It sounds obvious. It is not: the same pan is often sold in lidded and unlidded versions at similar-looking prices, and the lid is most of the difference.
2. Published dough capacity. The single most useful number and the one most makers omit. A pan that publishes it saves you a wasted bake.
3. Size against your household. Thirteen inches is a large quantity of bread. Nine inches is the size most homes should buy, and ten sits between.
4. Coating, or the honest absence of one. Silicone-based coatings, unspecified nonstick, or bare aluminized steel that seasons with use. All three are defensible; an unnamed coating is the least informative.
5. Gauge and construction. A lidded pan is a box under pressure from the inside. Thin, light pans warp first, and a warped pan is one whose lid no longer slides.

Lid on, lid off

One pan gives you two different breads, and this is the most underrated thing about the format. With the lid on you get the square, fine, even crumb. With the lid off it is simply a tall loaf tin and you get a domed loaf with an open top that you can score.

If you are new to the pan, bake the first loaf with the lid off. You will learn how far your dough rises in that specific pan without any risk of it fighting a lid, and then you will know what to scale to.

Sourdough in a Pullman pan

Two things differ from a standard artisan bake. The first is hydration: a very slack dough will not hold a square corner and tends to produce a dense band at the base. A stiffer dough — the sort of hydration you would use for a sandwich loaf rather than a rustic boule — suits the format much better.

The second is the final proof. In an open bake you can judge by feel and put it in when it looks right. In a Pullman you are proofing to a line, because the dough has to reach close to the lid before it goes in the oven — too far under and it never makes contact, too far over and it has nowhere to expand. Proofing to a visible level in a straight-sided pan is actually easier than judging a free-form loaf, which is one reason this pan suits people who find shaping frustrating.

Everything else carries over. The dough is mixed the same way, the starter is the same starter, and the loaf keeps the same way — see how to store sourdough bread.

Coated, or bare steel

Most Pullman pans are coated. The better listings name the coating — a silicone-based nonstick, stated as free of PTFE and PFOA — and the weaker ones just say "nonstick", which tells you nothing about what it is.

Bare aluminized steel is the other option and it is genuinely good: there is no coating to scratch through or wear out, it darkens and releases better with use, and it is usually cheaper. The trade is that you grease it properly every single time and you dry it rather than leaving it wet. If you already look after cast iron, this will not bother you at all.

Why the square loaf and a slicing guide go together

A Pullman loaf is the easiest bread in the world to slice evenly, because it is a rectangular block with flat sides that sits still on a board. It is also the shape that most bread slicing guides are actually designed around — the opposite of the round boule problem on that page.

If uniform slices for sandwiches or the freezer are why you are looking at a Pullman pan in the first place, that combination is the one that delivers it.

Lids warp, and that is the failure mode

The part that fails on these pans is not the coating, it is the fit. A thin pan that has been through a few hundred hot bakes can distort just enough that the lid stops sliding cleanly, and a lid that binds is a lid you will stop using.

That is the practical argument for a heavier gauge pan, and it is most of what you are buying when you pay the premium. It is also why a pan that arrives slightly stiff is worth returning rather than persevering with — it will not improve.

The short version

Buy the 9-inch lidded pan unless you know you want 13 inches of bread. Prefer a pan that publishes a dough capacity, because it saves you a bake. Take the uncoated steel if you are happy to grease and dry it, and the named silicone coating if you are not. Bake the first loaf with the lid off to learn your number, then put the lid on and stop thinking about it.