Paella Pan Servings & Dimensions

Polished Steel & Enamelled Steel Paella Pan Serving & Dimension Information

Paella Pans are tradionally described by the size of their top diameter. The base is somewhat smaller due to the sloping sides of a traditional paella pan. When cooking paella it is important to choose the right size pan to keep the paella thin. The most common mistake in cooking paella is to overfill the pan.

We have included some information for choosing the size of paella pan:

  • Main vs Tapas Portions

    Each pan is marked by the manufacturer for the number of "Raciones" it will serve. This is best described as a "tapas" size portion. It is slightly strange as in Spain you would never see a paella pan being used to serve these numbers of portions. For example a 50cm pan is described as serving 14 portions, but in practice it will be used for about 7 people (perhaps even less). However the sizing is used by all the pan manufacturers in Spain, so it isn't going to change. Therefor we have added a column for Main course size servings, that give a better impression of the pan capacity.

 

  • Minimum amounts for each size pan

    It is always better to use have less in the pan than the maximum number of main course portions. A thin paella (up to a depth of about 1cm) will cook and taste better than an overfilled pan. As a general rule of thumb, if you take half (or a little more) the value of tapas portions, that would be approximately the minimum amount of main course portions the pan can be used for. eg for a 50cm Pan max main course portions is about 8, min would be 14/2 so 7 or or 6

 
  • Cooking on a gas hob

    It is important to try and get an even cooking heat as possible. This becomes very neccessary in the later stages of cooking paella when the rice is cooking. The flame does not need to cover the whole base of the pan, but conversely you dont want a small concentrated heat in the centre. In practice a gas hob can cook up to about a 36cm (maybe a 38cm) pan depending on the size of the gas burners. It is possible to use larger pans on agas hob if they can span multiple gas burners. However this will mean moving the pan (not stirring the paella !) around while the rice is cooking.



    Remember normal paella pans are for gas or open fire only. If you are cooking on electric or AGA's then you will need one of our flat-bottomed paella pans

 

 
Pan Size Tapas Servings Main Course Servings

Top Diameter ex Handles (cm)
D1

Top Diameter inc handles (cm)
D2
Base diameter (cm)
D3
Max depth
D4
     
10cm - - 10cm 15cm 8cm 2cm
12cm - - 12cm 16.5cm 8.5cm 2cm
15cm Tapas - 15cm 23cm 11cm 2.5cm
20cm 1 small 20cm 27cm 14.8cm 3cm
22cm 1 small 22cm 32.5cm 18cm 3.5cm
24cm 1-2 1 24cm 34.5cm 20cm 3.5cm
26cm 2 1+ 26cm 36.5cm 22cm 3.5cm
28cm 3 2 28cm 38.5cm 23cm 3.5cm
30cm 4 2-3 30cm 40.5cm 25cm 3.5cm
32cm 5 3 32cm 43cm 27cm 4cm
34cm 6 3-4 34cm 44.5cm 29cm 4cm
36cm 7 4 36cm 46.5cm 31cm 4cm
38cm 8 5 38cm 51cm 33cm 4.5cm
40cm 9 5-6 40cm 52cm 34cm 4.5cm
42cm 10 6-7 42cm 54.5cm 36cm 4.5cm
46cm 12 7-8 46cm 59cm 40cm 5cm
50cm 14 8-10 50cm 64cm 44cm 5cm
55cm 16 10-12 55cm 69.5cm 48cm 5cm
60cm 19 15-16 60cm 74cm 52cm 5cm
65cm 25 19-22 65cm 83cm 56cm 6cm
70cm 30 20-25 70cm   61cm 6cm
80cm 40 30-35 80cm   70cm  
90cm 50 40-45 90cm   80cm  
100cm 85 70-75 100cm   90cm  
115cm 120 100-110 115cm   100cm  
130cm 200 170-180 130cm   116cm