I didn’t realize how much of a science cake-baking is until I read the cake section of BakeWise: The Hows and Whys of Successful Baking with Over 200 Magnificent Recipes
Here are a few tips that I picked up from that book that I’ve found particularly helpful or interesting. If you’re interested in really delving into the hows and whys of baking, then I highly recommend her books. It’s written assuming that you use wheat flours, but much of the content is still applicable.
1. Most cake recipes have you add flavorings, such as vanilla extract, at the very end of the mixing process. A better technique is to add the flavoring to the fat component of the recipes. Fat carries flavors easily, so if the flavoring is in the fat it will be better distributed through the batter.
2. When you’re baking it’s important to get the leavening agents, e.g. baking soda and baking powder, mixed evenly throughout the batter. One technique that is often used to do that is sifting. Corriher found that sifting actually did a rather bad job of evenly mixing the dry ingredients. Instead, mix the flour and leavening ingredients with a fork or hand mixer for 1 minute.
3. Cakes can be made with butter, shortening, or oil. Each of the fats has its pros and cons. Oil does a better job than the other fats of coating each grain of flour. Corriher states that this characteristic produces a moister cake because it greases the flour proteins, preventing gluten from forming and tying up water.
We don’t really care about that, but I’ve found that using oil gets rid of the graininess that is sometimes a problem with gluten free flours. When I made the yellow cake with butter it had a grainy texture. When I replaced the butter with oil, the graininess completely disappeared.
4. A cake is done when it reaches an internal temperature of 209 degrees F. I tested a new cake recipes this weekend and wasn’t sure how long it needed to bake. Knowing that the cake was done when it reached a certain temperature took all of the guesswork out of the process.
5. To keep a cake from sticking to the pan, line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper. For years I dismissed parchment paper as needlessly frou-frou. Now that I’ve used it, I’m in love. Parchment paper should always be in your kitchen, just like plastic wrap and aluminum foil.
To line a cake pan, lay the parchment paper on the counter and place the cake pan on top. Trace the outline of the cake pan and then cut it out, cutting to the inside of the drawn line. Place the cut-out parchment paper in your cake pan and pour the batter on top.
6. Did you know there was a general rule for how much baking powder and baking soda to include in a cake? If you include too much of either then the cake may rise too quickly and fall, creating a dense heavy mess. Or you may have a soapy aftertaste from too much baking soda.
For cake recipes, 1 tsp. of baking powder leavens 1 c. of flour. Baking soda is 4 times as strong as baking soda, so 1/4 tsp. of baking soda will leaven 1 c. of flour. Corriher mentions that you can look through “good” cookbooks and find plenty of cake recipes that are overleavened. I flipped through a few this weekend and she was right!
7. Egg whites help create the structure of the cake, but they are also very drying. If your cake recipe is too dry, you can replace some of the whole eggs with an equal weight of egg yolks. Increasing the sugar also makes for a moister cake. The amount of sugar by weight should equal or exceed the weight of the flour.
8. If you are making a chocolate cake then you can increase the chocolatiness by pouring a small amount of hot water over the cocoa. For a fudgy flavor, replace part of the granulated sugar in the recipe with brown sugar.
9. The size and type of the baking pan is important. A cake that falls badly in a loaf pan may do just fine in a Bundt pan which allows more heat to reach the center of a cake. Dark metal pans retain more heat than glass pans or light colored metal pans. Different sizes of pans require different coking times and different amounts of leavening in the cake. Be sure to use the same size and type of pan as specified in the recipe.
10. Cakes should generally be baked at 350 degrees. This temperature keeps the sides of the pan from setting too soon, which would result in an uneven layer, but lets the top set before all of the leavening escapes.
Back to Cooking Class: A Beginning Class in Gluten Free Cakes.