1,527 easy and fully explained recipes, with +66K photos and 78 videos

This site uses only a few technical cookies necessary for its operation. By continuing to browse, you accept their use.
To find out more...

Baking cakes

Where we see that to put a cake in the oven, once the dough is finished and in its mould, there is no hurry and that the cold is your friend.

45 K 4.1/5 (31 reviews)

Keywords for this post:Baking Cakes Cooking Dough Cold

Last modified on: June 28^th 2019

For this post: Comment Follow Ask me a question Send to a friend

Baking cakes

When you are making a cake, which most likely contains butter (sweet of course...), a pound cake or a moist chocolate cake for example, chances are that as soon as the dough is done, you put it in the pan and bake it immediately.

pâte crue en moule

It's classic, everyone does it that way, and then if, on top of that, you have a few kids around you who are getting impatient, and almost want it to be cooked before going in the oven, when they haven't eaten half of the raw dough before, the pressure is even stronger!

So putting it in the oven right after you've finished kneading your dough is quite classic, but it's actually not a very good thing, for two reasons:

The butter is often very soft, especially if the kneading was a bit long and heated the dough, which becomes very soft, and if there are additions in it (grapes for example) they will go down the pan more easily. How to correct this? Put the dough in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
The gluten contained in the flour (if there is any in your recipe) under the effect of kneading has begun to structure and "stretch" the dough making it elastic, which is not interesting for a cake because it hinders the rise during cooking. How to correct this? Let the dough rest for at least 20-30 minutes.

You'll have understood, there's no need to rush: Knead your dough, put the bowl or the mixer bowl in the fridge for 30 minutes (it's often the occasion to do a little washing up...) then only then put it in the oven.

Another option, once the dough is kneaded, put it in a mould, then put the mould in the fridge for 30 minutes. Bake then and only then.

gâteau pâte cuite

To sum up: Before putting a cake batter in the oven, it is always best to leave it in the fridge for about 30 minutes, as your cake will rise better when baked. In baking, the cold is (almost always) your friend.

Lasts posts

Oven height

When we put a dish or cake in the oven, we naturally tend to put it on the middle shelf, and that's what we usually do. But in some cases, this position and height can be a little tricky, so let's find out why.
October 8^th 20251,3715

The importance of sieving

In recipes that use a fine powder (flour, powdered sugar, etc.), you'll often see the advice to sift before using it. To sift is to pass the powder in question through a sieve (a very fine strainer) before incorporating it into your recipe. It's often advice, but is it really useful?
September 3^rd 20256,8513

The grease spray

As soon as you have something in a recipe that sticks to the mold, the question always arises as to how difficult it is to remove from the mold. There's nothing more frustrating than breaking your cake when unmolding it, because part of it has stuck in the mold. The classic way to avoid this is...
August 26^th 20256,2975

Cake moulds

When we make a cake, or a cake of the same rectangular shape, we usually take out our usual mould and tell ourselves that the recipe is anyway "for a cake", but is it really that simple?
August 25^th 20256,4005

Thinning out herbs

If you need to add a long-stemmed herb (tarragon, mint, verbena, thyme, etc.) to a recipe, you'll probably only need the leaves and not the stem, so you'll need to remove the leaves. Leaf removal means keeping only the beautiful leaves, and eliminating the ugly stems and leaves, but how do you do...
August 8^th 20254,5265

See all posts Random post RSS feeds

Other pages you may also like

What is the difference between bakery and patisserie?

This is a question that you may well have asked yourself and which I will attempt to answer. In France the two trades of "boulangerie" (bakery) and "pâtisserie" (patisserie and confectionery) have always been quite distinct, but where exactly do the boundaries lie? .
February 7^th 2017133 K 14.1

Chive flowers

Did you know that? Chive flowers are not only a beautiful purple color, but they are also edible and delicious.
May 29^th 201948 K4.4

Stand mixer tools

Whether we call it a stand mixer, food processor, or simply refer to it by brand (Kenwood, KitchenAid, etc.), this machine is a valuable tool for amateur cooks, bakers or pastry chefs like ourselves. All these machines come supplied with 3 different tools. Let’s take a look at their names and...
November 2^nd 201937 K4.5

The super powers of cornstarch

I start this new year by evoking an old product, that you most probably have in your cupboards, a white powder, often in a small cardboard package with a slightly outdated look, only the "gluten free" is relatively recent, it is simply cornstarch, hence its name of maïzena. It's used for a lot...
January 14^th 202214 K

Sugar syrups

In cooking, and especially in pastry, we often use sugar syrups, a simple mixture of water and sugar in varying proportions. Here is a presentation of their differences. .
January 17^th 202312 K4.8