Hi,

I have recently spent a little too much time in the kitchen making cake. Last weeks was a Lemon Polenta cake, and blinkin lovely it was too. However, upon making sponge-based cakes, they don’t rise so well and tend to be a bit on the heavy side.

I think I take care when folding the flour in, or whatever the recipe calls for.

Any suggestions as to where i’m going wrong?

I want to make a *HUGE* 3+ layered cake for my other half’s impending birthday, but want to get it spot on which I currently feel I don’t get.

Her fave is this wholewheat lemon cake. I don’t have a mixer and do it all by hand. Do I need to justify a Kitchenaid or such like?

Thanks ever so much, I know there are some cake aficionado’s on here 😉

JT

Put some cannabis in it. That way you will all be to wrecked to care. 8)
HTH

Are you sifting the flour from a height (rather than straight over the bowl).

are you using plain flour with Baking soda or being lazy and using the inferior self-raising stuff? also alot of people don’t know how to fold in their flour and knock all the air out. you scrape around the edge with the ladle and cut through the middle!

I could go and wake the mrs and ask her as she makes cakes for a living.. but I won’t..
I know that wholewheat flour isn’t your best friend for making a light and airy sponge but I don’t have a clue how to combat that.. I’ll ask mrs Yunki in the morning if I remember..

+1 the flour sifting.

also are you opening the oven to keep checking it? Try not to do this as the temperature drop wreaks havoc so it does.

Personally i would keep experimenting or even try a different recipe. Delia smith for starters or nigella whatserface. Cant go wrong with either

Also, when you remove the cake from the oven, give it a jolt by dropping it an inch or two onto the work surface,
This helps the cake stay risen as the jolt fractures the cooked bubbles in the cake and stops the cake deflating as the air that was trapped inside cools.
I learnt this from a Professor at Leeds who spent years researching colloids and cake structure.

I have a big long silicone coated tube which I hang from the upstairs windowsill , placing the mixing bowl underneath. I then sift the flour from upstairs. But only on a day with a southwesterly wind.

Oven. You’re not opening the door to check on it are you? Don’t.

Also make sure it’s not too hot or cold.

I never do any of the above stuff, my cakes contain only four ingredients mixed any old how, and they are always fab and always rise. Old family recipe 🙂 Can’t imagine how sifting flour would make any difference to be honest – after it all gets mixed up to buggery anyway.

Ok, gunna try CHB’s method, as I can get cakes to rise, but the drop badly as the cool.

Though this is my never fail cake – The Hummingbird Bakery Carrot cake, I only make 2 layers as it always without fail turns out huge! (oil based cakes always seem to do well)
Not exactly the same type as you missus’s favorite though.

Another great cake, though again not exactly a lemon cake is
Nigella’s Guinness Cake (recommended to me on here)

Baking Powder = Rise

Vegetable Oil = Lightness

or ask RedThunder’s Mum the queen of cake making.

Whisked up egg whites as if your making meringue folded in
like this Orange and Almond cake

I promise you will be one of the lightest moistest tastiest cakes you’ve ever had

Can’t imagine how sifting flour would make any difference to be honest

That’s ok. You stick to the computery stuff.

If it’s trad sponge really beat the fat and sugar hard to get it as light (colour and texture) as possible.

Sift the dry ingredients properly and only JUST fold them in – overworking the gluten in the flour is a BAD thing.

Don’t open the oven door.

Paula who I work with has just found a recipe that uses mayo instead of butter/marge – gives the sponge a very open ‘factory-made’ texture if that’s what you’re after. I’m sure a Google will find the recipe (how many “Mayonnaise Sponge Cakes” can there be?).

slainte 😯 rob

Just to stick my spoon into the bowl…don’t use a wooden spoon to the the folding, use a metal spoon or a knife as this will not let the mixture stick to the spoon. Other than that lots of practice everyone loves cake so none will go to waste.
Cheers
Mark.

just spit in the mix, then if anyone complains you will be laughing inside 😉

Are you using a gas oven? Since we got an Aga we’ve had wonderfully light cakes (Mrs Gti does like baking, yum) and I think it’s thanks to the very hot dry atmosphere in the Aga. When the Aga is off during summer and she uses the gas oven, which has a very humid atmosphere, the cakes are always disappointing. By the same token an electric oven ought to be better than gas, you would think.

Experiment with your oven temperature too. Fan ovens can cook the mixture before it has time to rise, so depending on your oven you may get better results from a lower temp or using the conventional setting.

Make your own baking powder for the win. Use 2 parts cream of tartar to one part bicarbonate of soda.

My wife did this and the resulting cake was amazing. Baking powder will absorb moisture over time and react less vigourously so the fresher the better.

Using margarine instead of butter helps a lot with sponge cakes, makes them lighter and rise more

I have a big long silicone coated tube which I hang from the upstairs windowsill , placing the mixing bowl underneath. I then sift the flour from upstairs. But only on a day with a southwesterly wind.

ha! 🙂

I have a big long silicone coated tube which I hang from the upstairs windowsill

Pervert.

Incidentally, where do you get polenta from? I keep looking out for it in supermarkets but can’t seem to find it.

Cornflour is what you need Cougar, as this is apparently all polenta is…

Now to find a decent source of wheatbran

Really? 😯

That’s ok. You stick to the computery stuff

Hah, I bet my awesome cakes are better than yours 🙂

My mum had trouble with cakes not rising well, turned out it was because she was cooking two at once, one on each shelf. One cake on one shelf in the middle – problem solved. This was a non-fan oven btw.

Well that what Nigella said to use as an alternative (see recipe):
http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/LEMON-POLENTA-CAKE-5308

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-polenta.htm

Cornmeal, not cornflour.

I bet my awesome cakes are better than yours

Stuff your cakes, where’s my damn camera bag?

(-:

I favour creaming-in over all-in-one for sponges. It helps if you have a stand mixer, so you can leave the fat and sugar to beat really well. I also change the over to convection instead of fan, to stop it drying the mixture out too quickly.

Opps 😳 , no idea why I read it as cornflour, my bad.

2nd on Nigella’s guiness and ginger cake – in fact that whole book is fantastic (kitchen) – the kids got it me for christmas, and we are loving cooking all the recipes in there (choc and peanut butter cheescake is gorgeous)

I got a huge bag of polenta/ cornmeal from the local Caribbean grocers shop

In my humble experience:

1. don’t over cream the butter and sugar, stop once it stands up on it’s own, about when it changes colour to cream.

2. don’t use self raising flour, add baking powder.

3. fresh baking powder, not some thats been in the back of the cupboard for two years.

4. does your over seal properly ? If not, get a new one, and make it electric. And don’t keep opening the door to check.

For mixing your cakes use a electric hand whisk not a spoon, a kitchen aid is unnecessary unless your doing lots/massive cakes.

You don’t need to sieve the flour as your now using an electric mixer. But if your using flour & a raising agent (not SR flour) then sieving them together helps to mix the raising agent evenly through the flour.

From the wholewheat recipe you linked to i would change points 2-6 of the method to this…
2. whisk together the sugar & butter until light & creamy (do not melt the butter, use it at room temp)
3. mix in the eggs. one at a time and make sure they are will mixed in. the mixture may start to look as if it is splitting.
4. add half the flour and mix well. add the rest of the flour.

Do everything else as instructed. Personally i’d swap the cream cheese for natural yoghurt but that’s up to you.

Using oil rather than butter apparently works, I often use 50/50 as I always have eggs/flour/sugar in the house, but rarely have a half lb of butter to hand.

Electric whisk? Pfffttttt, get a Kenwood Chef, add up the cost of the agerage cupboard and £150 doesn’t seem too bad, and they pretty much do everything, and you can leave it kneeding dough for ages rather than getting bored and suffering with half baked soggy pizza bases.

separate you eggs and whip the whites to a soft peak

thanks chaps – have decided to turn the temp down as it’s a fan oven, and have procured a new tub of baking powder. And as for technique, I’ll try a bit more fold than beat with the flower.

Will let you know how I get on!

cheers,
jt

flower

Ah, there’s your problem. Putting flowers in won’t make good cakes at all – you need flour which is ground up wheat.

Ha!! Silly me, flour is what I use, most definitely not flower ;o)

Well, did it work?

If you need someone to convince you to buy a kitchenaid, I’m yer man! Got a kitchen full of the stuff but the stand mixer really is a brilliant bit of kit. Ours gets used daily. Bread, cake, whisking things, grinding meat and even stuffing sausages. Would even have been worth full RRP.