[W]e talk a lot about doughnuts and waffles. We talk about my cat a bit too much. We talk about New Orleans and beignets and parades, and beads. We could, if you’re at all interested, talk about how many peanut butter cups I just shoved in my mouth. That conversation would be short and barely interesting. 6. That’s the number.
Today let’s talk about 7 ways to be a better baker. A few small tweaks and little nuggets of advice to build confidence in the kitchen. Read through and leave a comment below if any questions come up for you! I want us to be the best bakers we can be.
Cookie dough above: Vanilla Bean Confetti Cookies.
1. You’re only as good as your relationship with your oven.
Well, unless you’re a raw pastry chef, in which case, cheers to you. No need to have the fanciest, latest and greatest oven. It’s more about your relationships, how well you know each other, and how readily you accept all the quirks.
Some ovens have hot spots, little zones in that hotbox that are hotter than others. Get familiar the hot spots by seeing how a cake browns in the oven. Is one side more golden or burnt than another? Take note and rotate the your cakes and breads during baking.
Stop what you’re doing right now and invest in an oven thermometer. A gauge inside the oven is the only way to know how hot the hot is. Sometimes the dial doesn’t reflect the actual heat correctly.
2. Yes you have to follow the directions, mostly.
Baking is a delicate balance of flours, moisture, leavening, and heat. A recipe is there to hold your hand, lead the way, and give you a high-five at the end. You’ve got to trust the recipe to be good. Sometimes they’re not, but you have to trust the process, cold butter, buttermilk and all.
Here’s how to read a recipe. It’s nice to know how to read a map.
3. If you’re not using a scale, here’s we measure flour. It’s important.
4. Waste Not, Want Not
So often I end up with a container full of egg whites after making ice cream, a small handful of pecans, and leftover fresh herbs from various baking projects. Don’t throw these things away or let them languish to death in the refrigerator. Delicious treats come from leftovers! Don’t let em go!
• Turn egg whites into crisp Vanilla Bean and Cocoa Nib Meringues!
• Toss pecans, and whatever other nuts you have on hand into a batch of Oatmeal Cookie Granola!
• Smash leftover herbs into butter with lots of salt and call it Super Herb Butter. Delicious done!
5. Cakes can fall in the oven.
That’s not just something your grandmother said to get you from jumping up and down indoors. Cakes need a bit of care even when they’re in the oven. There’s a critical stage about 12 to 18 minutes of cake baking where the leavening and eggs are doing their best to support the rise of the cake, if you jostle the cake by rotating it in the oven during this period, the cake could sink in the center. No good.
6. Underbake or Overbake?
Underbake: skillet cakes, fudge brownies, and chocolate chip cookies. Soft, doughy centers are sometimes just the way to go.
Overbake: charred things, toast, hot dogs, and really nothing else.
7. Even the best bakers HATE a springform pan.
They always leak and make for really infuriating and soggy cheesecake crusts. It’s not right to blame yourself. They’re just the worst. And don’t even get me started about wrapping the springform pan in tin foil. That worked for one person once and then never again.
What’s the work around? A pie dish. See: Salted Caramel Cheesecake Pie
7. It is my mission in life to get you to make great pie crust from scratch.
Not an exaggeration. Pie crust is the perfect balance of fat and flour that combines, chills, and bakes into the perfect vessel for sliced fruit and hot oven temperatures.
Perfectly flakey pie crust requires a few things: gumption, guts, love, tenderness, confidence, and patience. Luckily you have all of those things. And butter. Don’t forget the butter!
Here are five tips for the best all-butter pie crust from scratch!
And don’t even think about buying one of those freezer-section pie doughs. I’ll know and I’ll come squint my eyes at you.
Happy Baking! With love and butter.
69 Responses
Thank you so much for these tips! I think lately I have been so obsessed with not over mixing my cupcakes. Or I am trying to decide whether I over mixed or I need a new oven.
Love your blog, and photos!! TOO AWESOME!!
One of the first things we did in our new house was buy an oven thermometer when I felt like our oven wasn’t getting hot enough. Sure enough, I have to bump the temperature up 25 degrees!
Loved this post- thanks so much for sharing, Joy!
Thanks Joy, for your always delightful and useful advice. P.S. “With Love and Butter” as an excellent cookbook from Lopez Island – you may enjoy :)
You are darling . . . your writing has so much personality. That being said, I love your tips. I’ve been baking forever, but always appreciate advice. Yours is on it. My mother is the best pie crust maker and i can’t seem to . She says it’s so easy. ha So I can’t wait to try your buttermilk recipe. what do I do to keep the pie shell from shrinking when baked? Thanks for your tips and look forward to more
xoMarta
Joy – do you have any recommendations on a good, deep pan for a cheesecake that isn’t a springform? I love tall cheesecakes but I don’t love dark brown butter leaking from the bottom of my pan!
So I have always had pie crust issues and I tried yours just yesterday for a quiche and it TURNED OUT!! thank you so much. Now if I could just get my chocolate chip cookies to stay plump instead of turning into pancakes; I swear I’ve tried every recipe and trick known and still never get them how I want them.
Aucontraire but I do feel your pain with the springform pan and wrapping it in foil and the water bath etc. It is simply for those advanced enough with time enough and freedom enough to play around and take all day which leaves most of us out…sorry RLB. And pie crust must must have part lard in it, preferrably 1/2 of total fat content and there is another secret ingredient which makes it pop – one Tablespoon of vodka in with the ice cold water…yes it is so, trust this grandma. You will never go back. i been baking since long before you were born, you lovely young whippersnapper. Keep on keeping on girl, you are awesome.
I love a spring form pan! That said, I rarely make cheesecake. But, it’s great for pizza Rustica and savory pies. I also love it for flourless chocolate cake. Love the idea of making a cheesecake in my Pyrex pie dish. Salted Caramel Cheesecake mmmmm…….
I am still working on learning to love my oven!
Kari
http://www.sweetteasweetie.com
What an insightful post! I always wanted to be a better baker, but I always feel like you have to follow the recipe, otherwise it might not turn out. These tips are great, I am going to try to follow them next time.
Juju Sprinkles
https://www.jujusprinkles.com
i like my springform pans. i line them with foil and use them as alternative super deep pie/tart pans. They make it easy to slide the pie out of the pan. This is particularly useful when I’m making a lot of pies, like for Pi Day. I’m not sure I’ve ever used them for cheesecake.
Oh Joy, how I love your blog…. A big breath of fresh air every time for this tired mama.
Such great tips! I gave up on a springform pan years ago! Hate them. I have a really nice oven that I paid way too much for and it doesn’t cook hot enough. I have to turn up most things by 25 degrees. If it’s only going to cook for 20 minutes or less, I turn it back to whatever was called for after I put the item in the oven. But anything that’s going to be in the range of 40-60 minutes is a trial and error situation. If I leave it on the higher temp all the way through, it will be overcooked. If I don’t, it’s not done. Makes it very hard to get meals to come out together.
Joy….you have taught me to make pie crust (1.5 years ago, maybe). All other recipes for pie crust are either a) thrown away or b) dismissed and replaced by yours, and yours ALONE! It’s perfect and amazing and my families eyeballs fall out every time they eat a bite-haha:o) Thank you soooo much!
I’ve been craving New Orleans beignets for a month and a half – basically since I got back from New Orleans! Killing me reading that part!
I used to feel that about spring form pans in particular the whole tin foil thing – always a disaster but one day I splashed out and got one of these with a gift voucher I was given. Never leaked and fantastic for cheesecake! https://pushpan.com/index.htm
thanks Joy the Baker! Such great tips! I totally stopped what I was doing and bought an oven thermometer. I have been meaning to do it for a long time, well done Joy the Baker for getting me to do it!
Your writing makes me happy. We share a baker’s spirit!
Have you tried a PushPan instead of a springform? It has a silicone seal to keep your crusts from getting soggy. I love mine!
Thank you for the tip on making your own pie crust. I was too afraid before to try, but will do so in the near future. Agree with the oven thermometer – this changed my life. The other item that changed my life was a digital scale. I even use it to weigh my cookies, to ensure that they are all the same size and so bake evenly. (Am I the only one that does this?)
I have recently decided to make my first butter crust….so I’m so glad you posted this !! And, all my life, I’ve had a problem with over-cooking cookies… but I’ve gotten better ! (I have a friend who thinks that hard-as-a-rock brownie edges are unavoidable…. too funny!)
As always Joy, I enjoyed this post – good tips all around. That you moved to New Orleans has been a real thrill as I am dying to go there. Would love to see more on that great city and all its fun quirks. Thanks so much for a fantabulous blog!
You are so great….I love you!
I made two pies using your all butter crust recipe this weekend (Pi Day!), and it was amazing! I also loved your trick of caramelizing the apple juices for an apple pie.
When I make cheesecake, I toss some nuts (normally leftover pecans) into the food processor with the graham crackers. They not only add a nice light toasted nutty flavor to the crust, but they also keep it crisp when the springform (inevitably) springs a leak.
I thought I left a comment, but don’t see it…if this is a duplicate, I apologize. I love your posts on how to be a better baker. I always enjoy reminders and the new learning helps too. What are your thoughts on using Nielsen-Massey Vanilla Paste instead of vanilla beans. My experience has been that so many times the vanilla bean doesn’t have much paste in it.
Karen
LOVE THIS! Thank you. I just moved into a new apartment and am currently wrestling with an oven so this post hits close to home.
xo
I always love your courses on how to improve our baking. Even the tips I knew bear hearing again when we love baked goods but have little patience. You help me to be patient when baking. Thank you! Oh, and your thoughts on the expensive vanilla paste sold by the company that makes great vanilla (sold at Wm Sonoma)?
Karen
My hate affair with springform pans ended after I invested in an ungodly expensive one from Williams Sonoma. It has a lip. It does not leak. It releases easily. No foil. It is magic.
Hey, I love my springform! Ease of removal, ease of cleaning, cheesecake and key lime pie bonanzas!
Can I just say thank you for # 7? Springform pans and I, we’re not friends. So nice to know I’m not alone
Great tips! Any tips on muffins? Mine are just the worst. Never can achieve that perfect dome.
This is such a great post! I’m only just beginning to venture into the world of baking and it still scares me a little. These tips help!
#4 – leftovers are what pizza and casseroles and quiche and the like were made for – great ways to use up odd bits and bobs. Well, maybe not egg whites, but there’s macaroons for that. :-)
I just can’t with the pie crust. You can only fail so many times before your heart will but let you go on. I’ve reached that point. Le sigh…
I don’t agree with your springform pan comment. I recently purchased two, after being on the fence for years, and they’re AMAZING. Mine don’t leak one bit, and it’s so easy to assemble them, and it’s so easy to get the finished product out of them! Perhaps you don’t have the right kind? I got mine (and they’re quite basic = didn’t break the bank) from Sur La Table. Highly recommend.
Hi, I’ve been watching all the old episodes of the Great British Bake Off (one season is currently on PBS, but I’ve been watching the back catalog on YouTube!), and I notice that caster sugar seems to be standard for their baked goods. This tracks with a British baking cookbook I found recently. Do you know why that is, and do you think it really makes a difference vs. granulated sugar?
Okay, get off my back about the pie crust thing. I’ll do one soon, I promise. = )
Can’t stop won’t stop.
Thanks, Joy! These are great tips! I was planning on baking today, so this post will come in handy.
Both numbers 7’s were good for me to hear, Joy! After my last homemade pie crust – which was drop dea gorgeous but couldn’t be cut with a knife it was so tough – I’ve been going the TJ’s freezer pie crust route. But I know deep down I can do pie crust myself. And springform pans… I needed to hear someone else say they were a pain. Thank you.
I love this! I am terrible at reading and following directions so I stay away from that type of baking and that’s so unfortunate. I will keep this handy!
Well dear Joy… I follow you for a long long time but I was never leaving comments (introverts and such stories, duh…) This post was a great push up for starting my own blog after year or two just soaking in my mind. And great, great thank you for that. Joy you are good. You are so good. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Cheers from Croatia :)
I know you’re right about the pie crust and I still haven’t made my own. Keep reminding me!
I keep meaning to buy an oven thermometer. Do you have any recommendations for good brands? I agree about weighing of ingredients, in the UK, the cup method of baking has never really taken off. All households here have weighing scales as standard. I’ve also never used a springform pan, but someone recommended one to me the other day when I was asking about baking a cake in a pan size smaller than the one stated in the recipe.
I’ll definitely never use one now!
Thanks for the tips.
These are great tips, Joy! I think the most important lessons I’ve learned in becoming a better baker fall into the category of knowing when to follow the recipe and when to get creative. Knowing what pieces of the puzzle can be mettled with to create your own flavor is probably the most important step to being able to experiment with baking (even though sometimes you’ll get it all wrong and your dessert won’t turn out anything like you expected!).
I made two pies this weekend (Pi Day of the Century) and was disappointed with the results. Both pies were new to me. I searched the internet for a recipe using canned peaches since I have a ton. Not very specific. I think I put too much thickened juice in it. It made the bottom crust soggy. Then I made Lemon Meringue Pie. I cooked the lemon until it coated the back of a spoon and held a clean line when I swipped. It ended up being runny too.
I’m usually good at making pies but these two got the best of me. Of course my guys still ate them.
Great tips!! I always thought that my springform pan just hated me. I’m a bit relieved to know that I’m not it’s only foe ??
munchies&musings
Great tips!! I always thought it was just me that my springform pan hated. I’m a bit more relieved to know I’m not it’s only foe ??
munchies&musings
Great tips! I’m the worst about neglecting the leftover bits of egg white. So frustrating!
Your buttermilk pie crust is so good, and so very easy that there should be a requirement to make it one time before some buys a poor imitation of pie crust rolled up and sad in the refrigerator section of the store. That dough boy would be out if business in no time!
I’m a teen baker, I started baking at 11 y.o. And I’ve started doing this as a business at 16, 3 months ago. I am confident in the kitchen and stuff but its always good to look for more knowledge from people with more experience! Thank you for the post!
Great tips! You DID get me to make my first all-butter flaky homemade pie crust! Also, I am so glad I bought a cheap little oven thermometer… that fickle thing was running 15 – 20 degrees over the dial!
I couldn’t agree with #7 more! Homemade pie crust is the ONLY way to go!
I have never made a from-scratch pizza crust that turned out well (taste and texture are always off). I always cheat and buy the Trader Joe’s crust. What am I doing wrong? I have tried numerous recipes.
I have the same problem! I’ve tried different recipes and techniques, but I always come up short.
I felt the same way until I found Jim Lahey’s overnight no-knead pizza crust recipe. You just leave all the ingredients overnight in a bowl, leave it to spread out in a cast-iron skillet, bake it in a super-hot oven and eventually find yourself eating the most exquisite deep-dish pizza that you made, even though you’ve only ever felt like a putz who can’t make pizza crust :)
Its called double 00 flour from Italy its the only way to get authentic Italian pizza crust the ap flour just doesn’t do it justice. You’ll probably need to order it online. Might get pricey good luck!
Being a baker requires a healthy combination of generosity – I want to share my creation with other people!! – and greediness – this is so delicious and it’s ALL FOR ME!
I won’t tell you which side of that paradigm I fall on.
I so agree with you on pie crust! It’s way too delicious & way too easy to make it yourself to waste a perfectly good pie filling on a mediocre store-bought crust. I’m also on a mission to get my loved ones to stop buying premade pie crust.
I think that all baking requires a bit of gumption! Cooking without a recipe comes easier to me, so I always feel like I have to pull on my big girl pants when I sit down to bake something. That being said, you’re inspiring me to try out my own pie crust. I’m also a big fan of rule #4….I think it’s a responsibility as a home-cook or baker to use up leftover ingredients in creative ways rather than let them go to waste. Thank you for the list and for inspiring our baking dreams!
This is such a great post! I just posted a mini-pies recipe on my site today and am like “I’m going to learn to bake pies from scratch damn it!”; I’ve mastered cookies but pies are next (even though I can admit I’m not much of a pie person).
What a great post! My favorite line is, ” I’ll know and I’ll come squint my eyes at you.” You have a great way with words, Joy!
I love that you mention under-baking brownies and chocolate chip cookies. Everybody always thinks I’m a nut when I share my cookie recipe that says “7-8 minutes…take them out when they’re still puffy and look under-cooked.” Then they do what they want and come back to me and say their cookies were hard and nothing at all like the ones I shared and, when asked how long they baked it for, the tell me 10 minutes because they didn’t look done yet. I just reprint the recipe for them with a smile and highlight the 7-8 minute comment. Thanks for the great tips!
Thanks so much for writing this – It’s just what I needed to stir some motivation. I was just talking to my hubby recently about learning how to really be better in the kitchen! This post is a great starting point. I’ve always been a recipe gal and want to start learning how to put my own creations together.
I can’t wait to try making a pie crust. I stopped at this little pie shop on a trip recently and they used a shortbread crust—it was AH-mazing. I’m obsessing about pie at the moment. Mmmm! Again, Thanks — and I promise to not make you have to squint your eyes at me for buying a freezer-section crust. Pinky promise!
I’ve never actually tested my oven temperature. Something I’m going to remedy immediately. Explains a lot.
clementinebuttercup.blogspot.co.uk
Good advice indeed! :-)
what a lovely post, I really enjoyed reading it. I can’t wait until I live in an apartment with an oven so I can get baking again!
Thank you so much for sharing all of these wonderful tips, Joy! I’m in total agreement with you on not being wasteful. I can spend way too much time scraping bowls clean to not waste one drip of batter and dreaming up ways to use extra yolks. Oh, and gooey chocolate chip cookies may be God’s greatest gift to human kind.