Baking Equipment – Will a Metal Dough Scraper Damage a Granite Countertop?

Literally speaking, a 900 g (2 lb) loaf tin is designed for a 900 g loaf. You'll be fine if you use that much dough.

Some mass does get lost during the baking process due to evaporation, so if you want to end up with 900 g and not less (as an actual bakery would try to do), then you want to plan for anywhere between 8% and 12% loss, depending on the kind of dough and how long you bake it for, as well as how quickly you cool it.

The standard figure for mass loss seems to be about 9%, plus whatever is lost during cooling - generally around 1-2%. I would compensate 10%, meaning to use 1000 g (1 kg or 2.2 lbs) of dough.

You are taking me way back here. Back in my teens I used to do this as a fun project - I used Plexiglass (acrylic glass) instead of old vinyl records (people still used record players back then!), but the principle stays the same.

No, your oven won't suffer if you are careful.

• The metal can / bowl / heat-proof object underneath must be something that can withstand the heat. Yet 200F isn't that hot.
• Always put a sheet of parchment or foil between your tray/rack and the can/vinyl setup.
• Watch carefully. As soon as it shows signs of drooping / bending, take it out. You may always put your future bowl back in the oven to heat it more.
• It might stink, so make sure you have a window open and air out the oven afterwards.
  Do not try to bake cookies and this at the same time ;-)