Baking for the first time , Vanilla Sponge cake for beginners - very detailed on how I baked for the first time
Hi All
Today my post is about Baking. Baking has always fascinated me, but there was always a stigma, a mental block to start baking. Till about recently , I thought baking could be done only in an oven, but thanks to you tube, and some web pages, I figured we could bake with our microwave since it had a convection mode, so really its called a convection oven. And on reading most of those blogs, i figured that most home chefs/bakers use a convection oven than a regular fancy oven / OTG that you see in cooking videos. Its more economical as it contains both microwave and an oven..
So my second stigma was that , what you bake in an convection oven wont taste or feel the same as a regular OTG baked goodies, but yea well , that's solved after I attempted a cake some months back ( Pillsbury cake mix) which turned out just fine
Another reason I kept holding back on baking is because of the ingredients and the actual recipes.. you see there are a truck load of recipes that you see online / books / blogs/ videos.. everything looks the same but none of them seem to have the same ingredients, so how do you choose. I search for basic cakes for dummies, for beginners, for Indians( as the way we call our ingredients are different from western standards example what the hell is half and half, we just have toned, double toned milk, is that the same? well I still Don't know...), all these yielded pretty basic recipes but it called for a lot of ingredients that I didn't want to waste. Now don't get me wrong, I really cannot explain to my in laws that i want to experiment baking and waste half a tub of butter or 4 eggs which is really expensive in India. But really nothing online on how you can test your baking skills with a small cake. I wonder why so, the answer is that while Baking may( MAY!!) seem like rocket science with everyone stressing on the accuracy of ingredients, its actually quite forgiving, even if you don't measure to the point, you can still bake a cake or at least that's what happened when i baked.
Now getting to how i overcame my stigma, I really want to make an egg less cake for my daughter's birthday next month.. now i have the motivation but really still no guts to try for the first time. So as I was contemplating, One day, it was my in laws wedding anniversary.. I didn't think / contemplate anymore and just went to the fridge, took some eggs, butter and vanilla essence and scrolled through my prepared recipe document for CAKE.. Then I had a challenge.. recipes usually or rather especially baking recipes called for precise amounts - in Grams or ounces!!! WTF!! I mean really?/ an ordinary kitchen does not have a weighing machine. Hello!!!?? .. so I Kind of eyeballed the ingredients, whisk whisk whisk, and put it into the oven and started gritting my teeth because really no clue as to what I'm doing except if this succeeds, then I shall be able to impress my in laws( it didn't work the way i planned but that's a different story :o )
So onto the Baking a CAKE part:
To bake you need a strategy! ( all you experts, shut up if you are laughing, You all started looongg back and must have made blunders along the way too )
So the strategy or game plan is that you need to prepare the ingredient and set it pre measured in separate bowl/containers etc and also need to have your dishes ready ahead of time.
To make a cake you would need flour,eggs( eggless is more difficult I guess), sugar , butter, vanilla essence, baking powder.
You need 2 deep dishes, one to whisk the eggs, one to whisk the butter and sugar.
You need a sieve and a dish to hold the flour
You need a baking tray, in my case i used the borosil glass deep dish that came with my Samsung Microwave( with convection mode).
You need either a hand blender or a manual whisk or fork( i used both)
If you are using granulated sugar, then do Step 1 onwards else start from Step 2
Game plan:
Step 1: In a mixer grinder / food processor, crush the sugar. Voila! you got icing sugar or confectioner's sugar that they sell for a fortune.. Save save!!
Step 2: In a bowl, sieve Flour and baking powder. set aside
Step 3: Microwave the butter to room temperature. that is for like 40 seconds till the butter is soft
Step 4: Wash your hand blender and dry it. No water should be on any surface
Step 5: Measure out the butter into a dish. Add the sugar. whisk it together till the butter looks creamy and well combined. It will turn pale yellow color. Make sure the butter doesn't solidify.
Step 6: Take the dish for baking and smear or spread butter generously all over the dish.Cake sticks so we need butter.
Step 7: Add 4 eggs and vanilla essence to a big deep bowl and beat it till ribbon consistency( beat and when u lift the whisk or blender blade the egg mixture should fall like a ribbon) which basically means the egg mixture triples in size and volume and enough air has gotten into the mixture.
Step 8: Into the bowl of butter add a bit of egg mixture and whisk till the whole mix loosens up. Now add the butter mixture to the bowl containing the egg. just add.
Step 9: Add the flour and mix really gently so as to not deflate the egg mixture. If you feel the mixture is too dry add a bit( not more than half a glass) of milk. If you are a wannabe professional like me, search for "Cut and fold" - that is the method of mixing the flour into the egg. You basically cut , take a bit of the mixture and fold onto the other side and continue till no flour is physically seen. No lumps or bits of butter. Everything should be combined, but don't over mix it please.
Step 10: Turn on the microwave. press the convection button to turn on the convection and preheat to 180 degrees. If you are using samsung /LG, both these have a fast preheat button separately. I think all C Ovens have these nowadays because apparently all of them gets manufactured in the same factory in China( lol here say). Anyways press the preheat button, reduce temperature to 180 degrees and press start. In about 5 minutes, it will beep saying that the temperature inside the oven is now at 180 degrees. The oven will continue to rotate as it needs to maintain the temperature.
Step 11: Pour the batter into the cake pan and open the oven and place the pan onto the wire rack. My oven has two, one small and one higher one. You always use the lower one for cakes and higher one for grilling as its close to the top grill.
Step 12: Once the cake batter is inside, then close the door and increase time to 30 minutes. My cake took 40 but you need to be constantly checking
Step13: Once done, remove immediately using a cloth to hold the pan as its Veeerrry hot and you can burn yourself. run a knife around the sides and invert on to a plate, leave to cool before cutting.
Optional step: you can decorate it with royal icing or whipped or butter cream but naked cakes taste equally well.
One thing you would love is the smell that comes out to the oven while baking... ooohh..!!
Recipe:
INGREDIENTS:
1. Butter - 225 grams, roughly its 3/4th of a cup, keep the cup consistent, the same cup should be used for measuring the other ingredients . a little less butter would be better for your health
2. Sugar - 250 grams or 1 Cup
3. Flour / Maida / Cake flour - 3/4th cup ( roughly almost a cup , no need to densely pack it till the rim of the cup)
4. Baking powder - 1 teaspoon
5. Eggs - 4 nos
6. Vanilla essence - 1 teaspoon( please try to use an expensive real essence, I got the 35 rs artificial essence from DMart and it kind of made me nauseous so i added only like 1/2 teaspoon)
optional: you can keep about 1/2 cup of milk if you think the mixture is too dense or dry, i didn't add and my cake was a little dense, i shall update the post if i make this cake again
Tools and Utensils:
1. Microwave with convection mode, the wire rack that comes with the microwave and the rotating table also inside the microwave
2. Whisk- Manual or a hand beater
3. Round borosil dish or a regular cake tin - make sure its deep
4. Three bowls for beating mixtures etc
5. Cloth or a oven proof glove to handle the cake tin
Method:
I wont elaborate as its already in the game plan. Basically combine all ingredients and pour into the cake tin and place in oven for 30 - 40 minutes, after about 25 minutes, open the oven and insert a fork or toothpick and if it comes out clean without any wet batter then your cake is done. Mostly at 25 minutes, you will see that some batter sticks through,mine was liquid in the center while brown and crisp on the edges. Keep checking every 5 minutes to a maximum of 40 minutes. The difference in temperature is usually because all ovens have different heating points. Once the cake is done, take it out immediately and invert. Cut only once its cooled down.
The texture that I got was quite dense and butter was oozing out, maybe you can reduce butter to like less than 3/4th of a cup but that will be experiment 2 lol.
Enjoy and post any queries you have on this post.
Today my post is about Baking. Baking has always fascinated me, but there was always a stigma, a mental block to start baking. Till about recently , I thought baking could be done only in an oven, but thanks to you tube, and some web pages, I figured we could bake with our microwave since it had a convection mode, so really its called a convection oven. And on reading most of those blogs, i figured that most home chefs/bakers use a convection oven than a regular fancy oven / OTG that you see in cooking videos. Its more economical as it contains both microwave and an oven..
So my second stigma was that , what you bake in an convection oven wont taste or feel the same as a regular OTG baked goodies, but yea well , that's solved after I attempted a cake some months back ( Pillsbury cake mix) which turned out just fine
Another reason I kept holding back on baking is because of the ingredients and the actual recipes.. you see there are a truck load of recipes that you see online / books / blogs/ videos.. everything looks the same but none of them seem to have the same ingredients, so how do you choose. I search for basic cakes for dummies, for beginners, for Indians( as the way we call our ingredients are different from western standards example what the hell is half and half, we just have toned, double toned milk, is that the same? well I still Don't know...), all these yielded pretty basic recipes but it called for a lot of ingredients that I didn't want to waste. Now don't get me wrong, I really cannot explain to my in laws that i want to experiment baking and waste half a tub of butter or 4 eggs which is really expensive in India. But really nothing online on how you can test your baking skills with a small cake. I wonder why so, the answer is that while Baking may( MAY!!) seem like rocket science with everyone stressing on the accuracy of ingredients, its actually quite forgiving, even if you don't measure to the point, you can still bake a cake or at least that's what happened when i baked.
Now getting to how i overcame my stigma, I really want to make an egg less cake for my daughter's birthday next month.. now i have the motivation but really still no guts to try for the first time. So as I was contemplating, One day, it was my in laws wedding anniversary.. I didn't think / contemplate anymore and just went to the fridge, took some eggs, butter and vanilla essence and scrolled through my prepared recipe document for CAKE.. Then I had a challenge.. recipes usually or rather especially baking recipes called for precise amounts - in Grams or ounces!!! WTF!! I mean really?/ an ordinary kitchen does not have a weighing machine. Hello!!!?? .. so I Kind of eyeballed the ingredients, whisk whisk whisk, and put it into the oven and started gritting my teeth because really no clue as to what I'm doing except if this succeeds, then I shall be able to impress my in laws( it didn't work the way i planned but that's a different story :o )
So onto the Baking a CAKE part:
To bake you need a strategy! ( all you experts, shut up if you are laughing, You all started looongg back and must have made blunders along the way too )
So the strategy or game plan is that you need to prepare the ingredient and set it pre measured in separate bowl/containers etc and also need to have your dishes ready ahead of time.
To make a cake you would need flour,eggs( eggless is more difficult I guess), sugar , butter, vanilla essence, baking powder.
You need 2 deep dishes, one to whisk the eggs, one to whisk the butter and sugar.
You need a sieve and a dish to hold the flour
You need a baking tray, in my case i used the borosil glass deep dish that came with my Samsung Microwave( with convection mode).
You need either a hand blender or a manual whisk or fork( i used both)
If you are using granulated sugar, then do Step 1 onwards else start from Step 2
Game plan:
Step 1: In a mixer grinder / food processor, crush the sugar. Voila! you got icing sugar or confectioner's sugar that they sell for a fortune.. Save save!!
Step 2: In a bowl, sieve Flour and baking powder. set aside
Step 3: Microwave the butter to room temperature. that is for like 40 seconds till the butter is soft
Step 4: Wash your hand blender and dry it. No water should be on any surface
Step 5: Measure out the butter into a dish. Add the sugar. whisk it together till the butter looks creamy and well combined. It will turn pale yellow color. Make sure the butter doesn't solidify.
Step 6: Take the dish for baking and smear or spread butter generously all over the dish.Cake sticks so we need butter.
Step 7: Add 4 eggs and vanilla essence to a big deep bowl and beat it till ribbon consistency( beat and when u lift the whisk or blender blade the egg mixture should fall like a ribbon) which basically means the egg mixture triples in size and volume and enough air has gotten into the mixture.
Step 8: Into the bowl of butter add a bit of egg mixture and whisk till the whole mix loosens up. Now add the butter mixture to the bowl containing the egg. just add.
Step 9: Add the flour and mix really gently so as to not deflate the egg mixture. If you feel the mixture is too dry add a bit( not more than half a glass) of milk. If you are a wannabe professional like me, search for "Cut and fold" - that is the method of mixing the flour into the egg. You basically cut , take a bit of the mixture and fold onto the other side and continue till no flour is physically seen. No lumps or bits of butter. Everything should be combined, but don't over mix it please.
Step 10: Turn on the microwave. press the convection button to turn on the convection and preheat to 180 degrees. If you are using samsung /LG, both these have a fast preheat button separately. I think all C Ovens have these nowadays because apparently all of them gets manufactured in the same factory in China( lol here say). Anyways press the preheat button, reduce temperature to 180 degrees and press start. In about 5 minutes, it will beep saying that the temperature inside the oven is now at 180 degrees. The oven will continue to rotate as it needs to maintain the temperature.
Step 11: Pour the batter into the cake pan and open the oven and place the pan onto the wire rack. My oven has two, one small and one higher one. You always use the lower one for cakes and higher one for grilling as its close to the top grill.
Step 12: Once the cake batter is inside, then close the door and increase time to 30 minutes. My cake took 40 but you need to be constantly checking
Step13: Once done, remove immediately using a cloth to hold the pan as its Veeerrry hot and you can burn yourself. run a knife around the sides and invert on to a plate, leave to cool before cutting.
Optional step: you can decorate it with royal icing or whipped or butter cream but naked cakes taste equally well.
One thing you would love is the smell that comes out to the oven while baking... ooohh..!!
Recipe:
INGREDIENTS:
1. Butter - 225 grams, roughly its 3/4th of a cup, keep the cup consistent, the same cup should be used for measuring the other ingredients . a little less butter would be better for your health
2. Sugar - 250 grams or 1 Cup
3. Flour / Maida / Cake flour - 3/4th cup ( roughly almost a cup , no need to densely pack it till the rim of the cup)
4. Baking powder - 1 teaspoon
5. Eggs - 4 nos
6. Vanilla essence - 1 teaspoon( please try to use an expensive real essence, I got the 35 rs artificial essence from DMart and it kind of made me nauseous so i added only like 1/2 teaspoon)
optional: you can keep about 1/2 cup of milk if you think the mixture is too dense or dry, i didn't add and my cake was a little dense, i shall update the post if i make this cake again
Tools and Utensils:
1. Microwave with convection mode, the wire rack that comes with the microwave and the rotating table also inside the microwave
2. Whisk- Manual or a hand beater
3. Round borosil dish or a regular cake tin - make sure its deep
4. Three bowls for beating mixtures etc
5. Cloth or a oven proof glove to handle the cake tin
Method:
I wont elaborate as its already in the game plan. Basically combine all ingredients and pour into the cake tin and place in oven for 30 - 40 minutes, after about 25 minutes, open the oven and insert a fork or toothpick and if it comes out clean without any wet batter then your cake is done. Mostly at 25 minutes, you will see that some batter sticks through,mine was liquid in the center while brown and crisp on the edges. Keep checking every 5 minutes to a maximum of 40 minutes. The difference in temperature is usually because all ovens have different heating points. Once the cake is done, take it out immediately and invert. Cut only once its cooled down.
The texture that I got was quite dense and butter was oozing out, maybe you can reduce butter to like less than 3/4th of a cup but that will be experiment 2 lol.
Enjoy and post any queries you have on this post.
Comments
Post a Comment