Top Baking Questions Answered

September 12, 2012
Our resident how-to culinary expert, Marge Perry answers the most-asked questions about baking cakes, cookies, pies and breads.
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Top Baking Questions Answered

Top Baking Questions Answered
Marge Perry, the voice of culinary wisdom behind our "Ask the Expert" franchise, is an award-winning food writer and instructor at the Institute for Culinary Education in New York City.  Read on for her expert advice on the most common questions about baking substitutions, freezing cookie dough, and how to prevent a cake from sinking in the middle.
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Adjusting Recipe Yield

Oxmoor House
Adjusting Recipe Yield
When you want to increase yield in recipes for cakes, muffins, cookies and other baked goods, you should be mathematically precise when you double (or triple) the ingredients, but not the cooking times. When you double the batter....

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Type of Pan

Type of Pan
Baking in a glass is different than baking in metal. The heat distribution in a glass pan is very uniform, but metal conducts heat better, so...
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Layer Cakes and Sheet Cakes

Photo: Annabelle Breakey; Styling: Karen Shinto
Layer Cakes and Sheet Cakes
A 13 x 9-inch baking ban is just about equal to two 9-inch round cake pans in volume, so the amount of batter should be about right for a sheet cake pan. If you double your recipe you will have enough batter for two 13 x 9-inch sheet cakes.

The depth of both size pans is about the same (2 inches) so the baking times will be fairly similar...

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Leavening Agents

Photo: Becky Luigart-Stayner; Styling: Cindy Barr
Leavening Agents
Baking powder and baking soda are both leaveners: that is, both help baked goods rise.

Baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) is four times as strong as baking powder and is actually...

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Sinking Cakes

Photo: John Autry; Styling: Cindy Barr 
Sinking Cakes
A cake that puffs up as it bakes and deflates as it cools has usually had air beaten into the batter too quickly or vigorously. Here are a few tips to prevent sinking cakes...
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Sinking Berries

Hornick/Rivlin
Sinking Berries
For cakes, muffins and other quick breads, and tarts that have fruit, toss the fruit with just enough flour to coat it well before you add it to the batter. Also, the lighter the pieces are, the less likely they are to sink through the batter...

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Chocolate Bloom

Chocolate Bloom
Don't be worried about that gray–white cloudy covering on your chocolate called "bloom." It's simply the result of being stored for a while at a somewhat warm temperature...

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Melting Chocolate

Photo: Evan Sklar
Melting Chocolate
To keep chocolate from burning, take it away from the heat before it's completely melted, and keep stirring until it is. When you melt chocolate on the stovetop, place it...
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Chocolate and Cream

Photo: Ellen Silverman; Styling: Toni Brogan
Chocolate and Cream
When you add warm melted chocolate to cold cream, it instantly hardens. Either melt the chocolate with the liquid...

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Substituting Chocolate

Photo: Beau Gustafson; Styling: Mindi Shapiro Levine
Substituting Chocolate
Unsweetened chocolate, as its name indicates, contains absolutely no added sugar, while bittersweet chocolate has anywhere from about 10% to 50% sugar. Because of the difference in sugar content, these two types of chocolate are not interchangeable in recipes...

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Freezing Cookie Dough

Photo: Ryan Benyi; Styling: Lynn Miller
Freezing Cookie Dough
Nearly all kinds of cookie doughs freeze well for up to three months. Form the dough into a log, wrap it tightly in plastic...
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Chilling Cookie Dough

Photo: Becky Luigart-Stayner; Styling: Cindy Barr
Chilling Cookie Dough
Most cookie dough can be refrigerated, well-wrapped, for three to five days before baking. If you want to make it farther in advance, freeze the dough...

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Oil, Butter, and Margarine

Oil, Butter, and Margarine
Before substituting oil for butter in a cake, cookie, or pie recipe, it's important to understand what each does and does not contribute to the outcome.

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Self-Rising Flour

Self-Rising Flour
Self-rising flour is all-purpose flour with baking powder and salt added. To make your own, combine 1 cup of all-purpose flour with 1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon of salt...
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Eggs

Eggs
When you're making quick breads and muffins you can use frozen egg substitute: one-fourth cup of egg substitute is equal to...

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Honey and Sugar

Honey and Sugar
To use honey in place of 1 cup of sugar, use 2 tablespoons less honey, add 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda and reduce another liquid in the recipe by...
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