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COOKING TIPS
Precision, please...
There comes a time in the life of every baker when everything goes wrong. Recipes that have worked many times before let us down pitifully. After a few failures, we start losing confidence. We end up feeling a tiny bit like Maria Callas in the early sixties: the greatest opera singer of her day, yet unsure whether each performance would be a triumph or a fiasco.
We do not advocate the solution adopted by Callas, which is locking yourself in a splendid Paris apartment and reminisce over your past pound cakes and pies (of course, in her case, it was Violetta and Tosca at La Scala ).
Instead, it is time to seek for the causes of your difficulties.
Most of your baking problems can probably be attributed to faulty measuring.
Invest in an oven thermometer and make sure your oven is actually at 350º when you set the thermostat to 350º. If there is a discrepancy, no need to call a repairman. Just remember to adjust the thermostat up or down as needed. At the California Café, we have 3 ovens: Mr Left is about 25º too weak, Mr Middle is slow to preheat but can, on occasion, overheat. Mr Right is... just right, and it is the only one we use for cakes, for they are less forgiving than bread or quiches.
Don't start making a cake from ice cold ingredients. Leave your butter and eggs on the countertop for a while before starting. A cold batter stresses your mixer and it is too stiff to fold beaten egg whites in. If you're in a rush, microwave the butter a little bit and warm the eggs, in their shell, in warm water.
Next, we recommend a scale for measuring flour. It seems like an awful bother, but the results are worth it. It is the only way to measure flour (and cocoa, and confectioners' sugar) accurately, especially if, like many bakers, you hate sifting.
So many recipes call for, say, one-and-a-half cup sifted all-purpose flour. If you sift correctly, you will measure only 6 ounces of flour, which is what the recipe calls for. If you skip the dreaded sifting and you "dip and sweep" one-and-a-half cup all-purpose flour straight out of the bag, you will have measured as much as 7 1/2 ounces of flour and your cake will be heavier, possibly even doughy.
Also, use the right flour. If your recipe calls for all-purpose, use unbleached all-purpose which is better all-around and easily available. If your recipe calls for cake flour, use just that. Good recipe books don't call for self-rising flour any more than they call for canned mushroom soup.
Speaking of good recipe books, therapy for the precision-impaired baker includes books by the following three ladies:
- Maida Heatter will be your best friend in the kitchen. Each one of her recipe is preceded by an endearing vignette, yet the recipe itself is reliable and clear. Maida will teach you good habits, such as lining pans so that cakes come out fearlessly. Her chocolate book is truly a title for the well equipped desert island (or dessert island, right?)
- Rose Levy Beranbaum can be a total nut (her recipe for Coulibiac, a salmon and couscous crèpe pie, could be lifted as-is into a comedy routine) but her simpler recipes are great and she provides indispensable weight tables of ingredients, in both U.S. and Metric. These tables, and your new scale, will give you confidence and make all your cakes better and lighter. Rose's basic technique is unusual (she doesn't cream the butter first) but her proportions still work if you incorporate the ingredients the old-fashioned way.
RECIPE
THE CALIFORNIA CAFÉ'S CRANBERRY UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE
CRANBERRY TOPPING
6 tablespoons BUTTER
1 cup BROWN SUGAR, packed down
1/4 teaspoon NUTMEG
1/2 teaspoon CINNAMON
12 oz (1 bag) CRANBERRIES, fresh or frozen
BATTER
13 tablespoons BUTTER
1 1/4 cup SUGAR
2 1/4 cups SIFTED CAKE FLOUR = 8oz = 230g
1 teaspoon BAKING POWDER
1/4 teaspoon BAKING SODA
2 EGGS
3/4 cup (no more) SOUR CREAM
2 teaspoons VANILLA EXTRACT
Preheat oven to 350º. Foil and butter two round 9" layer pans. Mix flour, baking powder and baking soda. Set aside.
Topping : Melt butter very slowly so that it doesn't clarify. Stir in the sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Pour into pans and spread with spoon a bit. Scatter cranberries on top, press with your hands and set in freezer while mixing batter.
Batter : With mixer, cream butter. Add sugar gradually. Beat well.
Add eggs, one at a time.
Slow down mixer. Add half of flour mixture. Incorporate. Add sour cream and vanilla. Incorporate. Add remaining flour mixture. Mix fast again for about 20 seconds. Give a few turn with a spatula and divide batter over fruit topping. With back of spatula, seal batter all over the fruit. Place cakes in oven.
25 minutes on timer.
Switch the cakes' positions in the oven and also give them 1/2 turn.
10 minutes on timer.
Start checking and adding 5 minute increments. Cakes are done when evenly golden, springy, and a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean and dry.
Invert immediately on cake plates. Remove pan first, and then,
very carefully, the foil.
Serve warm or at room temperature.
Do not freeze.
Best very fresh.
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