Basic baking tips

My mother used to bake like an angel. In fact, as a child, I was absolutely sure that my friends came to my birthday parties more for the cake than for me.


As I began baking, I discovered a LOT of interesting little things. Things that I kind of remember my mother doing but had no idea why she did, and now make complete sense to me: hanging cakes upside down, taking eggs out for hours, sifting various powders!!! So, here is a list of some of my realisations:


FLOUR
-ALWAYS sift your flour together with your dry ingredients at least twice. This ensures that the flour and salt, or baking powder or what ever else you are mixing in mix together well and there are no pockets or lumps


- I tend to use cake flour for my cakes, if you do not have cake flour, you can use all purpose flour, just use the same measurements for cake flour MINUS 2 tablespoons


- Do not use self rising flour, this is premixed with baking powder and loses it's effectiveness with time


EGGS
- The best way to incorporate air into sponge cakes and others is to beat them. Eggs can hold air in them best when at room temperature, so take them out about about 2 hours prior to baking


- Conversely, eggs are easiest to seperate when cold, so if your recipe calls for seperated eggs, seperate them, cover in airtight containers and leave out for 30 minutes


- Beat your eggs! When baking if the recipe calls for beating your eggs (which most do) DO NOT skip this step. Beating the egg yolks gives your cake a nice open grain, ensuring it is not dense as a rock. It also gives the cake volume. Beating the egg yolks gives it springiness, that nice fluffy texture


- Do not overbeat your egg whites. I have done this, it ruins the texture of the cake. Egg whites should always be beaten till they form either soft peaks, or stiff peaks depending on recipe: never stiff iceberg like shapes

Soft peaks: Good

Stiff peaks: Good

Icebergs: Not good

FOLDING
- This is the process of putting all your cake ingredients together so you can form the final batter, pour it in your oven and bake your awesome cake! Cake ingredients are never 'mixed' together, they are folded in


- Add the dry ingredients (flour sifted with other dry powders) to the wet ingredients (eggs) in bits. Using a rubber spatula/wooden spoon/hand run your instrument around the outer edge of mix pulling in. Do not mix vigorously! The flour should JUST be incorporated in, not over mixed. Over mixing the flour and eggs allow long Gluten (protein) strings to form within the batter which will give the cake more of a bread like texture rather than cake like crumble


- If adding in beaten egg whites last to batter do so carefully to make sure the egg whites do not get deflated. We want to try and keep as much air in them as possible. Again, add first a little, fold in gently, and then add the rest. Run spatula along the edge pulling in and repeat the motion basically turning the mixture in the bowl over and over again till everything looks uniform and mixed in


PAN PREP
- If the recipe says 'do not grease' pan, do not grease the sides of the pan. Not greasing the sides helps the cake rise higher, especially good for sponge cakes that are not being layered


- Even for a recipe that calls for an ungreased pan, grease the bottom of the pan, either spray on oil, run a stick of butter all over the bottom, or put in parchment paper on the bottom only and spray that with oil


- Cakes shrink while cooling, so not greasing the sides help minimize this, more on this below


- Cake pans are of multiple different materials and sizes, shapes and can often get really funky! The recipe should generally indicate which kind of pan to use, but if you don't have that size of pan, don't sweat. Just keep an eye on your cake for when it is done because based on size, height etc of pan, the cook time would be different


IN THE OVEN
- Always pre heat oven to indicated temperature


- Bake your cake on the center rack of the oven for even cooking. If you have enough cake for 2 racks, try to place both racks as much in the enter of the oven as possible


- Do not open oven while the cake is baking, this will cause heat to escape, air bubbles in the cake to deflate and the center of the cake to sink


- The cake is almost done when you start getting the amazing cake smell, mmmmm! At the end of the baking time indicated in your recipe stick a toothpick into the cake so it goes into the middle of the cake. If it comes out clean your cake is done


COOLING
- Cakes shrink after coming out of the oven, I did not know this! They shrink both from top down and sides in


- For sponge cakes (usually baked in tube tins) turn the tin upside down immediately on a glass or bowl or something so that it cools upside down to maximize volume and minimize shrinkage of the sponge


- Wait for cakes to cool completely before removing from pan, usually about an hour. You can do this by placing them inverted on a wire cooling rack if in a non greased pan, or just placing them on the rack for a bit if your pan was greased all over prior to baking


- Once cooled, to 'de pan' your cake, run a butter knife or sharp knife (in metal pans only) all around the edges, all the way down to the bottom to separate the cake from the cake pan


- Once the cake has been separated, invert your cake pan onto the wire rack and allow to cool for another half hour at least


- Wire racks are easy to improvise, I use one of the racks from my oven balanced on 4 bottles of similar size: Voila! Elevated wire rack for cooling

FROSTING / TOPPINGS
- I usually stay away from buttercream. Most cakes will come with suggested frostings and toppings, but you can play with this. I usually use homemade whipped cream that I stabilize, fresh fruit or fruit preserves/jam especially between layers of a cake






PLAY AROUND
Baking is fun! Once you get the hang of the recipes and nuances of baking in your specific pans and your specific oven you can start experimenting with splitting the cakes into layers, trying different frostings, stacking them, adding different essences , even adding fruit!

If you encounter specific problems with your cakes, or have questions about your specific ingredients, please feel free to ask through the comments and I will try to answer them as best I can!


HAPPY BAKING!!!