Ever throw away a cake because no one eats it after you sweated the whole afternoon baking one? Here are the top 10 reasons why your cake failed.
1) Taste
The cake does not taste right. Either it is too sweet, too dry, too hard, or even tasteless. You may have under or over-added certain ingredients into the batter and hence you are getting a poor result.
2) Impatient
You may be too impatient. You may have mixed your batter hastily without making sure the batter mixed evenly. Or maybe your whipped cream did not form stiff peaks because you rushed whipping it.
3) Equipment
You may be ill-prepared or do not use the right tools during the baking process. For example, some people find beating egg whites until they become fluffy too difficult by hand. This can be the case even when using a hand whisker. In this situation, it would be best to use an electric beater or k-beater. Also, consider investing in a set of good scales so that you can weigh your ingredient’s accurately. It’s a worthwhile investment for any baking afficionado.
4) Be Prepared
You never read the cake recipe properly. Always read through the recipe at least once, then make sure you have all the ingredients and baking tools in place. Baking tins come in many sizes and using the wrong sized tin is a common mistake. Unless you bake regularly and have the experience to adjust on the fly, without having the right ingredients or a plan to follow, you will most likely fail.
5) Temperature
Do you tend to over bake cakes? Always set the oven temperature to match that recommended in the recipe. Typical temperature settings are 170ºC/338F to 180ºC/356F. The baking duration is usually below 40 minutes, so take notice of the time.
6) Decorating
Your cake does not look nice. A well-decorated cake is just so more appealing. This is the time where you can let your creative juice free flow. There are many ways to garnish a cake and the range of decorative ingredients available nowadays is huge. Popular choices include chocolate chips, sprinkles, cookies, dried fruits or even melted chocolate.
7) The Customer Knows Best
Your loved ones may not like the type of cake that you are making. For example, people either love of hate certain cakes such a ginger. Understanding your customers’ taste and requirements is vitally important and should be central to helping you decide what to bake.
8) Poor Quality Ingredients
You use sub-standard ingredients. Always use fresh ingredients when you are baking and make sure your ingredients have not exceeded its expiry date. The way you store your ingredients is also important. Store them according to the manufacturer’s recommendation on the package label.
9) Incorrect Ingredients
You use wrong ingredients. A common example is using the wrong type of flour. There are many varieties of flour, such as plain flour, self-raising flour, wholemeal flour, sponge mix flour and many more. Using the wrong type of flour can end up a baking disaster.
10) Practice Makes Perfect
Your baking skills are simply not up to the mark. Remember that baking is just like any other skill set. It requires enthusiasm, patience and lots of practice. There are loads of free resources and books available online to help you improve your baking skills. Start with simple recipes to build experience and confidence before trying to tackle more complex baking projects. Just don’t give up. Practice, practice and practice even more… and good luck!
