Panasonic SDZB2502BXC - Breadmaker with Stainless Steel Body

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 38.9 x 25.6 x 38.2 cm ; 7 Kg
• Boxed-product Weight: 6 Kg
• Delivery Destinations: Visit the Delivery Destinations Help page to see where this item can be delivered.Find out more about our Delivery Rates and Returns Policy
• Item model number: SD-ZB2502BXC
• ASIN: B0055HSEOC
• Date first available at Amazon.co.uk: 11 Jun 2011
  

By : Panasonic
Price : £148.49

Product Description

Specialty Mode Jam Mode Compote Mode 100%Glutten Free Mode 100% Rye Bread Mode Choice of 3 sizes Crusrt Colour Control

 

Panasonic SDZB2502BXC - Breadmaker with Stainless Steel Body

 

Technical Details

• Automatically,Mixes,Kneads,proves and bakes Bread

Costumer Reviews

PROS:

- Makes excellent and most importantly tasty! bread

- Good selection of recipes

- Can do jam as well which i why i upgraded from my SD255, i always wanted to make jam

- Easy to use interface, all english words no symbols, see most washing machines to understand what i mean about symbols

- Reasonably quiet

- Actually is touchable when baking, the cooltouch housing does a good job, its not cool to the touch obviously its warm but not anything that could burn you. Its not like i would stand there and hug the thing while it bakes... but i saw another reviewer mention this and wanted to affirm its not boiling hot or anything

- Now says what its doing, resting, baking, kneading etc, nice addition from the older models

- Yeast dispenser! I dont know exactly what kind of an advantage this is but i think i had a few loaves turn out badly before because i forgot to put the yeast in and put it in last in my SD255, dont remember as it was so long ago

CONS:

- Weak fruit/nut dispenser door, this really irritated me i dont know if this is also the case with the SD2501 which also has the fruit/nut dispenser but i put some nuts on the door and it opened up right away causing them to fall right into the mix... I was not impressed. I took out the dispenser for a closer examination, i compared directly with the one from my SD255 and found the SD255s was much stronger, it was very difficult to open accidentally whereas the SD2502's opened with only a slight tap on the door. I did fix this however, read below to see how.

- Not much is new, this is only really a con if you are coming from another reasonably modern panasonic, its difficult to improve on perfection they say and the older SD255/257 models were very good indeed.

Overall i give this 4 stars... I am a bit ticked to have paid £144 for the "ultimate breadmaking machine" then i have to modify it on first use. I only saw 1 other reviewer mention the weak door so far and that was on the SD2501 page so it may be an isolated case. I fixed this by taking out the dispenser (just pull it out, designed this way for cleaning) and unscrewing the 2 screws that hold in the plastic lever. There is a small spring attached to the lever which is not strong enough to keep the door open when force is exerted on the door so replace the spring with one from a pen or something, i used one from a pen and the door is now as difficult to open as the SD255's i can push on it, put any amount of seeds/nuts/raisins on it and it will not open on its own. The machine can still open it by itself even with the stronger spring as i tested this earlier with a seeded loaf.

I would love to hear from others on the door issue, can you tap the dispenser door when its closed? What happens, does it stay shut or swing open?

I got this breadmaker about a month ago. I tossed up between this and the white version (SD-2501)without the yeast dispenser. Decided to pay the extra as my sister has an earlier model without a yeast dispenser and said her bread sometimes comes out a little lopsided, which she put down to the yeast mixing too soon with the water when using the timer programme. Actually, after reading the manual, it looked like her lopsided bread was due to her being a bit sloppy throwing the water in on top!

As with all the other Panasonic breadmaker machines I've seen or read about, this is excellent, the bread is delicious and there is loads to choose from. There has been so much said about that. It's all true. However, on the marketing front, I find Panasonic somewhat misleading, hence my 4 star rating. They say it has a new 'specialty mode'. Seems more like a new name rather than any new types of bread. The range of breads you can make is virtually the same as the previous lineup (models with rye mode).In fact, the ONLY bread I can see that you can make here that you couldn't make with the SD257 is a 50% whole spelt bread flour(in previous versions, the recipe didn't specify whole or white spelt so I'm assuming they meant white). That's it. Nothing else new on the bread front. So, as I said, great machine, but don't expect there to be a whole lot of new stuff here, despite what Panasonic would have you believe.

My second gripe would be that this stainless steel machine gets much hotter than the SD255/257 versions. Again, I guess it'a marketing issue but Panasonic do state it has 'cool touch housing' on their website. I thought perhaps my machine was faulty and asked Panasonic about the heat issue. Their response? "The cool touch housing indicates that despite the temperature inside the machine being incredibly hot, it is still possible to touch the outside of the machine". Not with my hands. I have to wait to move it, unlike the earlier white versions. To me this isn't a big deal but if you have small children around, it might be. There's nothing 'cool touch' about it at the end of the cycle.

So, all in all, a great machine. Personally, I just missed the specials on the outgoing SD257's or I would have snapped one up. I'm just hoping that jam and compote mode is worth the extra money..... I'll update my review when I've tried it....

 

Panasonic SDZB2502BXC - Breadmaker with Stainless Steel Body