PASTRY COURSE. LESSON FOUR: BASIC CAKE

The basic cake, is the first that all pastry must begin to make, from this recipe and with your creativity, you can get to get infinite combinations. I show you the ingredients and how it is prepared:

500 grams butter
1kg of refined sugar
12 eggs
½ liter of milk
½ liter of milk cream
1kg of sifted wheat flour
1 tbsp vanilla
1 teaspoon of baking powder (5 grams per 500 grams of wheat flour)
1 tbsp lemon rind

Preparation:
Before putting the oven to preheat at 180 ° C (fifteen minutes in advance), you must have all the ingredients and instruments you have to used to prepare the cake. You can beat it by hand or with an electric mixer. Separate the eggs from the yolks, gum and flour a mold of 30 cm in diameter x 10 cm high. Sift the wheat flour together with the baking powder. The term sieve means to pass through a colander to avoid lumps and aerate the flour.

In a separate bowl beat the egg whites to the point of nougat. That is, they are firmer than the point of sigh. How to know? They are so rigid that you can cut them with a knife in two. Remember that for the egg whites to rise to the desired point, you must have completely dry and free of fat, the beaters of the blender and the bowl. Likewise, the egg whites should not have any buds.

In the blender place the butter at room temperature, together with the sugar. Beat until a creamy mixture forms. Then add the yolks one by one, together with the vanilla. When adding the vanilla at this point, as this prevents the cake from tasting egg, wait for it to whiten the mixture. Then add alternating sifted flour and milk and cream mixture (preferably with a trowel). At the end add the whites to the nougat point in an enveloping way with a palette.

Place the mixture in the mold in combed and floured. If you want the cake to be flat, you should hit the mold gently, dropping it from about 5 cm in height, this will cause the large bubbles of air to rise to the surface of the mixture and you will not get crater surprises when baking. Take to the oven for 1 hour at 180 ° C. You must not open the oven before 45 minutes, because afterwards the cake is lowered. You should always keep the same temperature from start to finish (including the preheating time).

How to know if the cake is ready? Insert a wooden stick, if it comes out dry, the cake is ready, if it comes out wet it needs cooking. You have all the secrets, from this basic cake have come many other recipes, which can creatively turn it into your professional secret. Other tips For the cakes that are used to make sculptures, you should change the ½ liter of milk to ¼ liter of cream. In this way the cake will be more compact for this purpose. All ovens are different, try the temperature between 5 degrees or so, until you get the ideal temperature of your oven.

As I always tell you, try test and then tell me how they fit.