Buzzfeed – you left us hanging! You showed us the painful (but familiar) disasters that sometimes happen when we bake but you didn’t show us how to avoid the mistakes that cause them.
In an effort to rescue home cooks everywhere from committing these baking crimes, I’ve collected the videos below to give you an education on how to avoid common baking fails.
1.Blob Cookies
In addition to placing your cookies farther apart on the tray, Beeta Hashempour recommends that we refrigerate our cookie dough before baking.
2. Scorched Biscuits
Prevent scorching your biscuits and cookies by using a good quality baking pan (avoid the dark pans), baking on the middle rack of your oven and making sure your oven temperature is correct.
3. Cake Sticks to Pan
You can make sure that your cake releases from the pan by preparing your pans properly before cooking. Watch the video below from Allrecipes - just don’t forget to remove the parchment paper from the cake.
If you want to save a step, you can purchase pre-cut parchment circles that fit your pan.
4. The Deflated Cake
Cakes that fall in the middle most likely have had the cooking process interrupted in some way. You’ve either taken the cake out of the oven too soon or opened the oven too early or too often during the baking process and interrupted the cooking.
5 and 6. Cracked Cake and Crumbling Cake
There could be several reasons that your cake cracks or crumbles. First, check your oven temperature to make sure that it is not too high. Next, be sure to measure the ingredients properly. Also avoid over-mixing your ingredients. If all else fails, your cake will still be delicious as cake balls or a trifle.
7. Melting Icing
Frosting a cake that is still warm will cause the icing to melt. Watch the video below from America’s Test Kitchen for the proper way to frost a cake.