Lately, I’ve been working on a recipe for a Chorizo Sweet Potato Tot Hotdish, a southwestern twist on the Midwestern original using black beans, jalapeños, and enchilada sauce. I had been making it in a classic 9x13 casserole dish and wanted to test a smaller batch. But all I had was an 8x11 smaller oval baking dish.
For a minute I was stumped. But I remembered I wasn’t alone. This is a question we get all the time on the Hotline: How do I double/half this baking recipe? Or, can this circular tart be made in a square tart pan?
I then remembered that one of our superusers, Nancy, who has responded to hundreds of questions before I even joined Food52 (thank you, Nancy!), had offered up a foolproof hack to resizing a baking dish recipe, every time.
Simply take a large measuring cup and fill each baking dish with water to determine and write down the amount of water used. You’ll now have the volume of each baking dish. In my case the 9x13 held 14 cups of water, and the oval dish held 8 ¾ cups.
Then I could determine the ratio between the two volumes: 8 ¾ ÷ 14 = ⅝! I was now able to pull exactly how much of each ingredient I needed for the recipe. So, instead of using 8 ounces of cheddar cheese, I used 5.
This will work for all types of recipes and types of baking dishes. So now, thanks to Nancy, we never have to think twice about how to do this properly.
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