Use your loaf! (Groan...!) (Panasonic SD253)

Member Name: razielle

Product:	Panasonic SD253
Date:	19/03/09 (133 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: perfect bread every time... as long as you follow the rule book!

Disadvantages: spare/replacement parts expensive

I bought this bread machine for my mother a few years ago, but now find that I use it more than she does. I absolutely love making my own bread, you know pretty much what's going into it (depending on the ingredients you use of course, though I tend to try and use products which are chemical/processing-free as far as possible).

The machine came with an excellent instruction and recipe booklet which I use regularly, I love to make bread with all kinds of seeds and nuts, even lavender in, and as long as I follow the easy to-to-follow instructions, every loaf turns out well. I have had a couple of bread-disasters, but they only occurred as a result of human error, or if I decided to try and be a bit creative and add less or more of something than they recommend. Learned my lesson though, to be honest the best thing to do with this machine is to do what you're told and save creativity for hand-baking (which I also like to do from time to time)!

I realise that this may sound restrictive, but in actual fact there is a really good amount of choice here with all the built-in functions.

All you have to do is remove the pan from the machine, then bung the ingredients into the pan (it tells you all the quantities required for whatever size/type of loaf you want to make), select the settings you require, such as type (Basic White, French, Italian, Sandwich, Gluten Free etc); Small/Medium/Large, and Light/Dark setting options.

Yes, Gluten-free is included as an option! A real bonus, and the bread turns out much better than anything shop bought (which is really not that difficult, I know!) but all the same, for this function alone I would recommend this machine to all coeliacs.

Not only that, but it has a nut dispenser tray into which you can place your nuts, raisins or seeds for release into the mixture at the right time during the process.

Since I began using this machine I have gone right off shop-bought bread. The only trouble is that my loaves from the machine never last very long because I tend to cut it into door stops, and end up eating it as soon as it is cool enough! It keeps well though, it can be frozen (although I would recommend slicing it first, and perhaps evn freezing it in portions so you don't have to defrost all of it when you only want a couple of slices).

The only other bad point I would make is that the cost of any spare parts is huge. When I bought the machine I think it was about £80. I expect you can buy it for much less now, as it will have been superceded by newer models, but you can probably buy another machine for the cost of let's say, a replacement pan. And a nut and raisin dispenser is going to cost around £30 if bought separately (bonkers!). That said though, I have never had any cause to replace anything, and this machine has had an awful lot of use over the past couple of years.

The pan is quite robust, though you really don't want to be sticking a knife or other metal object in there to dig your loaf out as the sides will scratch and then lose their non-stick qualities. Best thing I found is to lightly brush the inside of the pan with a bit of oil before adding the ingredients, and to allow it to cool before trying to tip the loaf out.

In terms of cleaning it couldn't be simpler, you lift out the pan and pull out the kneader from the centre (which just slots on/off a spindle) and give both pieces a wash with a cloth dunked in warm soapy water. The instructions do advise against immersing the pan in water, though I must confess to having done so, only once or twice, but as I was an idiot and stuck a knife in there once (wasn't I just advising against doing that?!) and scratched the inside of the pan it sometimes will get cooked mixture stuck inside, which of course shouldn't happen if you a) don't scratch it, and b) use a little oil to line the pan, as suggested earlier. You can reach into the machine and give that a wipe around every so often, but I don't find that it gets all that messy, as the contents are added to the pan when it's removed from the machine, and they all tend to succesfully remain there.

The machine weighs 454kg, a bit heavy to keep putting away/taking out, so I tend to keep it on the worktop ready to be shoved out when it is to be in use, and as this is quite frequent, it's more convenient for me to have it out all the time. When it's working, it does need to be positioned with nothing too close around it, this is to allow for air cirulation around the machine, which will prevent any overheating.

When I make a loaf it takes about 4 hours, though depending on the type of bread you want to make, this can be halved. The final 30 minutes or so is when you start to get the wonderful aroma, a sure signal that there is no reason on the planet why you should ever buy a rubbish nasty tasteless and chemically processed loaf of bread from the shops again. Second only to hand-baked, THIS is the best bread ever! It smells tasty, it tastes tasty, blow me if it isn't just the tasiest bread from a machine!

Although I've used it regularly, I surprise even myself as I haven't yet used it to it's full potential, for example I have yet to attempt the pizza base function, though I do really love the sound of home-made pizza, not to mention the cakes and biscuits!

This is the first bread maker I ever bought, and it was chosen on the strength of reviews I read, such as this one! Oh the irony... however I believe it was a very good purchase, well worth paying the extra for at the time, and I would consider another Panasonic machine in the future (if the reviews said it was a good 'un!), though I'm hoping that I won't need to buy another one for some time yet.

Summary: Blow me if it isn't just the tasiest bread from a machine!

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