Read the recipe through from beginning to end before you start. Ensure you have everything you need and all ingredients. Give yourself time to pre-heat the oven and have ingredients at their correct temperature. Leave time to chill ingredients or pastry if necessary.
Invest in some electronic scales and always have some spare batteries. They are essential for baking where accuracy is so important. They also make it easy to double check measurements: put a cup measure on them, zero the scales, then fill with your ingredient and you are able to check the cup measure too! When measuring out sticky substances like honey or treacle, warm in the microwave first or grease your tablespoon or measuring cup with oil first so it will slip off. Remember that an Australian tablespoon is 20ml!
Buy an oven thermometer and keep it in your oven so you know its true heat . Don’t put things in until the temperature on your oven thermometer is stable. Drop the temperature on your oven dial by 20’C if it is fan-forced. Ideally put cakes as close to the middle of the oven as possible. Rotate cakes and biscuits during cooking so you get to know any hot or cold spots.
Use correct temperature ingredients. For light, melt-in-the mouth cakes always use softened butter and room temperature milk or cream. If you’ve forgotten to take it out of the fridge, grate it, or you can place cubes of butter in a Ziploc bag or between sheets of baking paper and roll with a rolling pin (or wine bottle). Never microwave! Bring eggs to room temperature before using or they won’t emulsify properly. If you’ve forgotten to take them out of the fridge, place in a bowl of warm water for 15 minutes. Pastry usually requires cold butter, grating it is a great technique, then rub in flour lightly with the tips of your fingers.
The right size tin is important for recipe success. Measure them across the base and through the middle. Write the size on the base with a permanent marker so you can easily see what size they are every time. Use the right tin when called for in a recipe or the baking time will change.
If a recipe calls for nuts or berries, toss them in flour before adding to the cake batter to keep them from settling on the bottom of the pan. If cried fruit needs cutting, dip scissors in flour so it doesn’t stick. Much easier than using a knife.
When making cupcakes, use an ice cream scoop to put the batter into each hole. This makes it easier and cleaner to get it all into the hole, and ensures each has the same amount in it.
Purists blind bake by lining pastry in a tin with baking paper and weighting down with pastry beads, beans or rice. Coins work better as they conduct more heat but either way you need to remove the paper and weights and return to the oven to dry out the base. Much easier to prick the pastry all over, freeze it and cook from frozen.For a quick “luxe” version of shortcrust pastry, buy ready-made puff pastry. Cut it to size, prick it and place between two pieces of baking paper and two baking sheets, or baking tins. Freeze then put into a hot oven weighted down to prevent the pastry rising. When almost cooked, remove the top layer to brown. You will have crisp, great tasting pastry.
Cooling: Leave cakes in the tin for 5 minutes or more so the cake doesn’t crack when turning out – a piping, hot cake can run the risk of splitting. Cool large cakes on a wire rack for 20 minutes before removing from the pans. This allows the air to circulate underneath it and prevents condensation. Remove cup cakes from the pan immediately and place individually on a wire rack to cool to prevent over-cooking.
For smooth icing, brush the cake mixture with a jam coating first, or a thin layer of icing. This seals the cake and acts as a base for icing to be added, meaning a constant top level that doesn’t have bits of cake or crumbs lurking within. Partially freezing the cake before icing helps too.
