While it may appear simple to follow the directions for a specific baked product, working with baked goods can be much more challenging than just sautéing some pasta for dinner. For this reason, we’ve compiled some of our greatest baking tips so you can bake successfully the next time you’re in the mood for some cookies, cake, brownies, etc.

Use high-quality ingredients

The amounts of moisture, fat, and protein vary between brands of wheat flour, butter, yogurt, buttermilk, and flour, and these minor changes significantly impact how the final product turns out. The flour is the main ingredient and matters most, so you should choose high-quality flour like Spelt flour for baking. Generally, look for brands that best fit your baking needs and stick with them so you can predict how they will behave in your recipe.

Prepare your ingredients in advance.

The last thing you want to do is fumble a recipe just because you had to look for an ingredient! Gather everything before you even begin baking. Making this preparation in advance can help the procedure go much more smoothly.

Grease your pan perfectly

If a recipe instructs you to grease a pan, grease it with cold butter! Using a stick that has been chilled, evenly coat the pan with butter. This prevents your baked dish from adhering to the pan in the future and functions far more effectively than cooking spray.

Poke the dough before prepping to test it

If your dough is fully proofed and prepared for baking, you can quickly tell by giving it a gentle poke. It’s not ready if the dough immediately springs back. If you prick the dough and the hole slowly returns, the dough is perfect.

Add a little oil when melting chocolate.

Melt chocolate with a bit of oil if you’re coating baked goods with it! This contributes to the smooth texture of the chocolate by thinning it out. Coconut oil is the ideal oil to use, although odorless vegetable oil also performs well.

Add a small amount of sugar to the yeast.

Dry yeast will readily bloom if you feed it a modest amount of sugar. When sugar is specified in a recipe, you should add it at the stage where yeast you combine with water or milk. If it doesn’t, add a tiny amount of sugar to “feed” the yeast. Yeast will bloom beautifully.

Bake from the center of the oven

Baking anything you are baking in the center of the oven is recommended. The very last thing you want is to eat cookies with burned bottoms! Before starting to heat up, put the rack in the center of the oven, so it’s ready to go when it’s time to bake.

Cool frosting before piping

Make sure your frosting is completely cool before you begin piping. Compared to the frosting resting at room temperature, colder frosting is considerably simpler to deal with. You don’t want your cake to be covered in frosting!

Final words

Use high-quality ingredients, measure your ingredients and mix well to achieve perfectly baked goods.