"baking instructions" news and stories

Now that you have finished your cake, let's review the steps. You read your recipe carefully, preheated the oven, made the streusel, greased the pan, creamed the butter, added the eggs, finished the batter and baked it. It's time to taste it.

The cake is moist, rich and delicious. It isn't a light, spongy cake, but it is very tender and does not seem heavy or dense. I don’t know if I’ve ever had a cake with this much streusel on it – in fact, there was nearly as much streusel as batter in the recipe! I loved how simply pressing the streusel mixture into big chunks before spreading it on the cake resulted in professional looking and tasting topping. Aside from the hitch with the incorrect baking time being given in the recipe, I didn’t have any problems and found the recipe to be easy to follow. This cake is a little too rich for everyday breakfast, but it is a great choice for special occasions and is classic comfort food. The recipe says this serves 10-12, but I far prefer to cut it into 16 smaller slices.

Thanks for watching this "episode" of Cooking Live with Slashfood!

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

Put your finished cake into the preheated 350F oven and bake. Martha's recipe says that this will take only 50 minutes, but mine took quite a bit longer, which is hardly surprising given the size of the cake. Perhaps it is not the ingredients or method, but instead the baking time that causes people so many problems when they are working with recipes published by Martha Stewart Living. It is also possible that more people enjoy raw cake batter than I previously imagined. Unless you, too, enjoy raw batter, I suggest that you always perform the "toothpick" test or simply bake until the cake springs back to make sure that your cake is finished. When a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, it is done.

After the cake has cooled slightly, you need to turn it out of the pan and onto the cooling rack. Run a sharp knife around the around the outer and inner edges of the pan. Remove tube portion with cake attached. Run knife over the bottom, loosening the cake. Gently replace cake in pan high-sided pan, which will support it as you turn it upside down. Place a clean dishtowel on top of pan and a baking sheet on top of that. Carefully flip pan over, turning cake out onto the baking sheet. Reinvert onto wire rack. Allow to cool completely.

 Once the cake has baked at 350F for 60-70 minutes and a tester has come out clean, you're almost done. Move the cake to a wire rack to cool for 15 minutes. After loosening the cake with a knife, carefully turn it out onto a baking sheet and reinvert it onto you wire cooling rack. Cool completely.

There is only one more things to do.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

Once your eggs have been added, alternately add the yogurt (or buttermilk) and the flour mixture. Adding ingredients alternately allows for thorough and even incorporation without over mixing, which can make the resulting cake tough, not soft. In any recipe that calls for you to alternate or add ingredients in multiple additions, you should make sure to end with an addition of dry ingredients. This is the easiest way to tell that you have mixed well enough, because you are finished as soon as all the flour has been incorporated into the batter. Don't forget to scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as you mix.

Add the yogurt and flour alternately to the creamed butter/egg mixture. Scrape half of your batter into the greased, 10-inch tube pan that you prepared earlier. Smooth batter with a spatula and top with 2 ½ cups of streusel mixture. Scrape remaining batter into pan, on top of streusel, gently spreading it to the sides of the pan with your spatula. Use your fingers to squeeze remaining streusel together into large and small chunks, then top batter with all remaining streusel. It's time to bake the cake.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

Once your butter and sugar mixture is light and fluffy, it's time to add the eggs. Eggs should always be added one at a time because fats and liquids do not mix together well. While egg yolks are fatty and blend in relatively quickly, egg whites are not, and when you add them to your creamed butter and begin to stir them in, you will see that they resist incorporation. A minute of vigorously whisking the whole egg into the batter will break up the egg and allow it to be properly mixed in. It is also simply much easier to work with the eggs one by one, rather than having a huge amount of liquid sloshing around in the bowl. The batter will look smooth and shiny once the eggs are added. If it curdles a bit, don't worry about it. That can happen because of the wet to dry ratio or because the ingredients were at slightly different temperatures. Just keep going.

Break all your eggs into a small bowl and add them to the creamed butter one at a time. Then get your bowl of dry ingredients, because it's time for the next step.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

With your dry ingredients set aside, you can begin work with the butter and sugar. It is important for the butter to be at room temperature when you begin to work with it here, as soft butter will be mixed more evenly with the sugar than cold butter. Creaming the butter allows for the creation of tiny air bubbles. These bubbles will trap air and expand when the cake cooks, creating a lighter texture than a cake made with oil or melted butter, neither of which will create air bubbles when mixed with sugar. If you butter is cold, not at room temperature, it will result in uneven creaming and you will probably see air pockets in your cake when you slice it.

When creaming, look for a smooth and fluffy consistency, not granular. I recommend using an electric mixer or some sort for this. It will take about 3 minutes on medium-high speed. Once your butter and sugar are creamed together, continue on.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]