India 16 November 2016: With Christmas and New Year close at hand, we know that a lot of you’ll are planning to bake cakes for the festivities. We have put together some tips on how to bake some amazing Christmas cakes.
•You need to remember that baking cakes needs a lot of patience and passion to do it. The speed and technique of folding the batter is the key to baking some amazing cakes. The slower you fold in the batter, the fluffier your cake will turn out.
•No matter what cake you are baking keep to the basic ratio of 1:1:1 of flour: eggs: sugar to bake the perfect cake. So you have to take 1 kg sugar and 1 kg eggs for 1 kg flour. The quantity Changes depending on how big a cake you want, but the ratio remains the same.
•You can also experiment with your cakes by adding powdered spices like cinnamon, ginger and allspice instead of the usual fruits and alcohol.
•If you are planning to make a chocolate cake make sure to choose single origin chocolates, like those from countries like Cuba and Venezuela to get the perfectly yummy chocolate cakes. If you can’t find them, you can choose chocolates which have higher percentage of cocoa.
•To make a white chocolate cake, use a double boiler to melt the white chocolate. Double boil is a method of melting chocolate by keeping the container in which you are melting the chocolate in a pan filled with water which is set on a low flame, this is done so that the chocolate doesn’t get burnt.
•One of the most delicate cakes to bake is a cheesecake. If you bake a cheesecake at a high temperature, the cheese could crumble in the centre. So to perfectly bake a cheesecake use a double boiler and bake it between 120 and 130 degrees.
•Avoid adding the same liquor to all types of cakes, as certain liquor only tastes good with a certain type of a cake. So make sure you choose the right liquor for your cakes like rum goes well with strawberries, champagne or whisky with chocolates and so on.
•You can experiment with your chocolate cakes, by adding flavours like hazelnuts, raspberries, vanilla or saffron.
•We all love plum cakes for Christmas. To get that rich taste to a traditional plum cake, you need to soak the fruits and berries at least four to five months in advance so that the liquor gets properly absorbed by the fruits. This practice gives the cake the rich flavor. The liquor added to plum cakes acts as a preservative which can keep it edible even after a year, but we know it won’t last more than two days in our homes with all those rich flavors!