I will NOT throw the cake pan across the room....

[kitanzi]

No matter how much I want to.

A couple weeks ago I baked a cake, as a practice run for the birthday cake I planned to make for ACat's birthday this weekend. It baked fine, but came out of the pans VERY badly, which I figured was because I didn't flour the pans enough. Ok, stupid mistake but easy to fix - I never tried baking a cake before.

Today, I decided to bake a cake for his birthday to take along to dinner with friends tonight. If it turned out well, I'd make another tomorrow for just us. Well, I greased the pans and floured the pans until they were nice and floury white on the insides. I baked two layers in them, and they smelled and looked lovely. I took them out and let them cool while we went out shopping, came home and took a short nap, work up cranky with a headache, and went to take them out of the pans, perfectly cool.

It was a fucking disaster. It wouldn't come out and it wouldn't come out. I whacked the pan, I beat on the pan, I tried to gently cut it loose with a knife, ACat tried whacking the pan, and finally tried to pry it out with a fork while I fumed and tried VERY hard not to act any more like a frustrated five year old than I already was. It ripped into several messy pieces, and came out in handfuls, with much of it visibly coated with flour on the bottom!

I haven't even tried to get the other one out - we're eating the ruined one with icecream and chocolate syrup to make lemonade out of my lemons, but can anyone tell me what the hell I did wrong? I was so sure I'd figured it out and fixed it, and I would REALLY like to try again and make him a proper birthday cake. The box does say to let them cool in the pans - is that wrong? I've even contemplated trying next time in the springform pans I have for cheesecake, but I don't think I have two the same size.

Comments

[devinsong.livejournal.com]

Wow- I thought everyone used the trick my mom taught me, and yet no one has mentioned it.

Before baking-
1)Grease the pan.
2)Cut a piece of waxed paper the same size as the bottom of the pan (can be done easily by tracing the pan as it sits on the paper using a knife or the pointy end of the scissors, then cut out the shape you traced).
3)Put the waxed paper in the bottom of the pan and smooth it so there's no big air pockets.
4)Grease the top of the waxed paper.

Then pour in the batter and bake the cake. The best time to take the cake out of the pan is when it has cooled enough you can pick up the pan in your bare hands but it is still warm to the touch (the cake is fragile right out of the oven, and sticks harder to the pan if completely cold). Run a knife around the edge of the cake to loosen it from the sides of the pan. Put a plate or cookie sheet over the top of the pan (possibly with plastic wrap over it if the top of the cake is tacky and you don't want bits from the surface to stick). Then flip the pan and cake pan together so the cake pan is bottom up. Gently lift the cake pan off the cake, tapping the bottom of the pan if needed to encourage the cake to come out.

Important: Don't forget to remove the waxed paper from the bottom of the cake.

Then let the cake *completely* cool before you frost it (otherwise frosting melts).

Honestly, I've made layer cakes this way since I was about ten and I can't remember *ever* breaking the layers in pieces. I made all the 9x13 sheet cakes this way that got turned into guitar and rocket shapes for Concertinos '99 and '03. I have three 8" layer pans (I *wanted* two 9" ones, but I needed pans in a hurry and the store was out, and I'm too cheap to get another set of pans so I've been making triple and six-layer cakes ever since!). So believe me when I say this is fairly foolproof!

*looks thoughtful* It's been a while since I made six layer chocolate with whipped cream in the layers... perhaps for the next MASSFILC meeting...

[devinsong.livejournal.com]

Oh, msminlr did suggest the waxed paper. Missed that on the first pass!

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

Yknow, with the amazing guitar shaped cake I saw you put together for Concertino, you really should have been the FIRST person I thought to ask about this. I'm about to start making the next try at it now (day off, mental health day after all the insanity!) using your tips, so wish me luck! (And don't tell ACat - he's at work! *G*)

[devinsong.livejournal.com]

My lips are sealed! *zips*

Well, in your defense, the guitar wasn't a layer cake! It was actually made from 4 sheet cakes, which I extracted from pans using the method I described and then froze on cookie sheets. Once frozen, I just slipped them into large freezer bags. They were easy to store and handle as frozen slabs until the day of the con. Then I arranged them on the foil-covered cardboard, laid the large guitar template over the cake and cut and arranged the pieces, sticking it all together with frosting. Lots of frosting! Would you believe that I had *never* decorated a cake like that before? Total improvisation on my part.

Good luck! I've honestly *never* had a problem with this, in dozens of cakes. Tho I think part of your prior issue was probably letting the pans get completely cold. There's a really big difference between cake sticking/structural integrity at hot/warm/cold. (When hot, it's not sticking but the cake is too fragile to come out in one piece. When cold, the cake is stronger, but it's also sticking harder than the cake will survive to get it out. When it's just warm, cake strength exceeds the bond to the pan... excuse me, I just lapsed into engineer-think there for a moment!)

When you've got this down, if you want to try baking cake from scratch, I've got a couple of easy recipes I can recommend. :)

~R

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

Well, I took them out just before heading out to meet ACat for lunch, and they came out like a charm! I just now finished frosting them, and I'm ready to call this a success. I have one symmetrical two layer cake in the requested flavors of cake and frosting, with frosting on all the appropriate bits and no holes or chunks. *G* It's not the most elegant frosting job, but I'm happy with it! And yes, I do remember you decorating that cake. I remember you were trying to figure out what to use for guitar pegs, and Frank came up with some root beer barrels from somewhere that worked well. You also had candy legos all over it for the "future tech" look, which bemused me since I didn't know those existed. That was still the best consuite I have ever seen, and I'm not saying that just because I helped. :)

[devinsong.livejournal.com]

Ooh, you should take a picture of the cake before it gets eaten! I'm glad it came out well! (Someday I'm going to take a cake decorating class just so I can find out the secret to making them look pretty, but I suspect it's in the frosting- and I love my butter frosting recipe- I'm not going to change to something I that doesn't taste as good to make it look prettier!)

And that's right.. I remember you guys came over and helped transport all that er..stuff..to the con. You typed up all the recipes for me while I was doing battle with decorations. You'll laugh- I distributed those to a bunch of folks after the con, and just a few months ago, Alan Thiesen emailed to ask if he could get another copy- apparently someone out west has been using them to do con suite baking, but lost them, and needed them back!

*g* The remnants of those candy legos took forever to get eaten, too. Talk about playing with your food.. JT certainly found them more fun as toys. I hadn't known about them either.. I found them in a candy store while looking for cake decorating inspiration. *Usually* I stay out of candy stores, on the theory that what I don't see, I won't eat!

Speaking of which, I need to head home.. do a bit more painting, then head down to Clinton to help JT finish packing..moving day tomorrow!

Tell ACat I wish him a happy belated Cake Day! Hugs to you both-

~R