Bake off

Carol O’Callaghan says Christmas is around the corner and it’s time to prepare for baking sessions.

IT’S only October and who really wants to consider the ‘C’ word? But if we are to have well matured plum puddings and cakes by Christmas, this is the month to climb into the back of kitchen cupboards and retrieve cake tins, mixing bowls, cooling racks and pudding bowls, and put them to work. Yes, indeed, the great Christmas bake off is upon us.

Baking is fun and can be strangely relaxing, but preparation is key to prevent wasting time, and stressing as you have a last minute forage in the garden shed for a tape measure to ensure your tin is the proscribed 8“. Meanwhile the fruit is sinking in your batter.

Cake tins, cooling racks, pudding basins, a large saucepan or pressure cooker, mixing bowls, wooden spoons, and rubbery spatulas to clean off the last vestige of batter are some of the basic essentials. So too is a large stack of tea towels and a decent pair of oven gloves. Whoever invented the single glove clearly did little baking or had the strength of Atlas to lift a weighty cake tin in and out of the oven. Do buy two separate gloves for flexibility and, if possible, ones that stretch well beyond the wrist and ideally above the elbow like a gauntlet. Otherwise you might be adding first degree burns to arms already compromised by vigorous stirring of batter.

You’ll need measuring cups for American recipes, or scales if your recipes are home grown. Many good cooks don’t weigh ingredients, but unless you are a seasoned baker, measurements have to be exact for best results. A mixer on a stand, if you have one, has the added value of leaving you hands-free to get on with other jobs.

Traditional metal cake tins are best so don’t be tempted by fashionable silicone versions. As an amateur baker I was seduced by pink silicone ‘tins’, that look adorably chic sitting alongside a collection of cookbooks, a coffee pot and a trio of herb pots all styled beautifully on a kitchen shelf. But they don’t conduct heat well and their flexibility means they’ll buckle when taking them out of the oven and crack your precious cake top. So stick with tried and tested tin and avoid adding to the stress of hoping your cake doesn’t burn on one side that has to be scraped off and filled with marzipan to disguise the disaster.

It really won’t matter how good your equipment is in the preparation stages, and how much careful time and appropriate method you’ve devoted to the mixing of cake batter and pudding mixture, if your oven is suffering from a broken door seal that allows heat to seep out.

Then again it might be time to invest in a new stove. Many bakers swear by gas, maintaining its higher moisture level produces a better cake. But since the advent of the two-oven kitchen, you can now get one electric and one gas which plays to the perfect world of the domestic goddess, though probably less essential to us aspiring ones. ¦ Next week we’re getting cosy with winter lighting.