How To get your bakes right: baking tips for beginners
Baking can be different things to different people. While as an experienced baker, I use baking to unwind and relax, it can provide the opposite stimulus to someone who has just started baking. While most of us can eat almost anything that we cook as long as it is not burnt, raw or over salted, the same cannot be said about baking. Unsuccessful baking experiments generally end up in the garbage bin sooner rather than later, instilling a fear of failure in beginners who are learning this cooking technique.
Keeping this phenomenon in mind, we provide you here with a list of some online baking tips for beginners that will help you get better baking results and become friends with your oven.
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- Always Start Simple: Baking is a skill that needs to be learned step by step. You can start out trying to make a three tiered cake as your first baking project, but it is a given that you will somehow mess up. Choose and try easy recipes in the beginning since this will not only result in success most of the time, it will also give you the required confidence to handle complicated recipes in the future. As a beginner, do not go for a recipe where the preparation time is more than thirty minutes or the number of ingredients is more than 10.
- Do Not Substitute: While cooking food, we often substitute one thing for the other and it still turns out to be tasty and edible. However, unless a sub is mentioned in your baking recipe, it is best to use all original ingredients. The key to do this is to check that you have all ingredients in your pantry and fridge before you start mixing them. If you do not have all the ingredients for a recipe, select a different recipe or do not start till you buy all of them.
- Get Everything Together Before You Start: Timing is quite crucial in baking, and therefore it is important that you have everything at one place before you start mixing your ingredients. Beginners often get confused and add things to the recipe before or after they are supposed to be added. This will definitely result in imperfect products. So have everything on hand before you take out the mixing bowls.
- Preheat The Oven: You might get so mixed up preparing your dough or batter that when the time comes to put it in the oven, you will find that you have forgotten to preheat it. Not preheating your oven, or letting your batter stand for long after it has been prepared does not make for good baking. Always ensure that your oven is preheated at the right temperature before you put your dough or batter in it. Otherwise be prepared for partially raw or burned cookies and cakes.
- Use The Correct Measures: Not mixing ingredients in the proper ratio when baking is a major cause of failed baking attempts. If you want your recipe to turn out properly, take care to mix everything in the exact amount that it is mentioned—no more, no less. Remember the main fundamentals of baking are proportion, temperatures (ingredients and ovens) and timing. Getting these right will take you long on the way to successful baking.
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