Cooking a good cake is a simple task, if you respect some basic aspects, such as mixing and cooking times and the temperature at which the oven should be set.
To prepare a cake, basically you must be very clear in advance about the recipe you want to make. Our advice is that, before you start preparing your cake, have all the ingredients at hand , as well as the instruments that you are going to use, such as your kitchen robot , pastry molds .
Once you have everything in sight you can prepare your cake without problems. If you need ideas, on our blog you will find multiple tips to make a good cake , with different flavors and textures.
If you want to have a perfect ally to make the best cake, we recommend you try our Series 8 ovens , which incorporate the Assist function, with which you only have to worry about selecting the desired recipe. In addition, its PerfectBake sensor measures the humidity inside the oven, turning off when the cake has reached its optimal cooking point. However, we are going to tell you 8 golden rules to prepare a cake like a professional pastry chef.
8 basic tips to make a good cake
- The cake has swollen in the center, but not around the edges
This may be because you have greased the walls of the pan to make the cake. Avoid spreading them, as this will cause the cake to lose strength around the edges. To remove the cake from the mold, you can do it with the help of a knife.
- My cake has crumbled
It is possible that, to cook your cake, you have used too much liquid or that the temperature of the oven was too high . Next time, try making it with less liquid or setting the temperature 10 degrees lower. And, in any case, review your cake recipe to make sure the cooking and mixing times are correct.
We also recommend that, to protect your cake, you use protective plates and place them under it. They have to be the same diameter as the cake, and they will avoid breakage when transporting it or when plating it.
- The cake is too dark on top
This means that your cake has burned, probably because you placed it too high on the baking tray , or because the baking temperature was too high .
- The cake is too dry
This has happened more than once even to the best pastry chefs. If the cake is too dry, it has probably been in the oven too long. We recommend that, on the next attempt, you reduce the cooking time.
A trick to fix a dry cake is to prick the cake with a toothpick and pour a few drops of fruit juice -lemon, orange, tangerine, strawberry, currant…- or some liquor -peach, pacharán, punch…-. You’ll see how your cake is very fluffy!
- The cake has browned unevenly
This is usually because the oven temperature was too high . With a lower temperature, the cake will brown more evenly. If you are trying to cook a so-called ‘fine pastry’ cake, bake it by activating the top/bottom heat mode on your oven.
- The cake is too light on the bottom
The reason is that the cake has not received enough heat from below . In your next recipe, place it in your oven one level lower.
- Fruit juice leaks out of the cake and stains the oven
This happens when the tray used to bake the cake is not the right size, so the fruit juice can end up splashing on the walls of the oven. Our advice is to use a universal baking tray .
- I have made two cakes and one has browned more than the other
When we have a birthday party with many guests, it is common to have to prepare two cakes and try to bake them at the same time. To prevent one from browning more than the other, we recommend using the 4D heating function of ovens, which distributes the heat evenly throughout the oven, allowing you to cook on up to 4 levels at the same time.
