Baking Cakes and Decorating for beginners

A big discussion appeared on social media. This was in one of the group for baking cakes and decorating for beginners.

The discussion was about how to prevent cake sticking to greaseproof paper linings. The paper was pulling all the edges off, leaving large chunks of cake on the greaseproof paper. The person posting wanted to know how to remedy this.

Bakers use greaseproof paper to line the bottom plus walls of their tins. And they reported varying results.

They tried turning the cake upside down. Removing it from the tin whilst still warm. And then the paper removed from the sides and bottom whilst the cake was still warm. This action meant that the paper came off without causing damage to the sides.

The damage appeared to happen if the cake cooled with the greaseproof paper in situ. Pulling the paper off then caused the damage – as it was stuck to the cake in the cooling process.

Some bakers recommended their favourite greaseproof brands, available in their areas. Others said try parchment paper instead.

Some suggested spray oil minus any paper linings at all.

I only ever lined rich fruit cake tins. Then I used cake release for Madeira and sponge cakes, with no problems ever.

I also found it painful to cut out greaseproof linings.

You can buy disposable discs and linings in varying sizes.

Plus you can also buy reusable washable linings too in varying sizes.

It depends upon how often you think you will need to use a specific cake size lining. You do need to think about the expense of buying reusable linings.

So have an experiment and think about your costs and requirements moving forward too.

You can use butter to coat a tin and then cover the butter with flour. Add some flour into the greased pan and roll it around to cover the grease. Knock the excess out by turning upside down and bin the excess flour. Experiment with pan sizes and volume of flour required a few times. And you will soon gauge exactly what you need. Run a cranked palette knife or offset spatula around the edge once the baked cake is removed from the oven. Doing this before you attempt to turn out the cake as this will ensure a clean edge too.

Chose another method if you are making chocolate flavour and the finished design is to be a naked cake. As the flour and butter method might not suit, due to the flour showing up on the baked chocolate cake edges. This would spoil the look of a naked chocolate cake.

You can also make your own cake release too, instead of buying it. If that is the route you wish to follow, I discovered a link to share, showing exactly how to do this.