You could be saying what is a baking belt or even why would you want to use one anyway, well here’s my why…
Baking belts come in various shapes and sizes and I own a fair few. If you don’t know what they are, they are material belts that you ‘wet’ and then put them around your cake tin before you bake a sponge cake. Their purpose in my opinion is to try and stop your sponge cake ‘dome’ in the centre when they bake. For some cakes the ‘dome’ in the middle of the cake adds character, for instance a Victoria sponge cake that is just filled with jam and buttercream then a dome can look lovely.
However, when you want to have flat layers, which is the desired result for a wedding or celebration cake then the dome gets sliced off and in reality you are loosing valuable cake. So seeking to get a level bake is ideally what you want to achieve. I’ve used mine a fair few times in the search for a level bake, but I’ve really not had much success and when I cut into the cake it isn’t cooked how I really like, so I’ve ended up throwing the cake away which is so annoying.
For me now to get a ‘leveller’ bake I have started baking my cake at a lower temperature, yes it takes longer, but I love the result so much more. My sponge cakes are now baked at 150 degrees in my fan oven and so far so good.
Maybe it’s my oven, maybe I’ve not used them in the right way, but I’m really in the camp that there’s something for everyone, and we can choose whatever works for us, but for me, I really can’t get on with them at all and will stick to my way from now on…
Happy Baking love Caroline xxx
You could be saying what is a baking belt or even why would you want to use one anyway, well here’s my why…
Baking belts come in various shapes and sizes and I own a fair few. If you don’t know what they are, they are material belts that you ‘wet’ and then put them around your cake tin before you bake a sponge cake. Their purpose in my opinion is to try and stop your sponge cake ‘dome’ in the centre when they bake. For some cakes the ‘dome’ in the middle of the cake adds character, for instance a Victoria sponge cake that is just filled with jam and buttercream then a dome can look lovely.
However, when you want to have flat layers, which is the desired result for a wedding or celebration cake then the dome gets sliced off and in reality you are loosing valuable cake. So seeking to get a level bake is ideally what you want to achieve. I’ve used mine a fair few times in the search for a level bake, but I’ve really not had much success and when I cut into the cake it isn’t cooked how I really like, so I’ve ended up throwing the cake away which is so annoying.
For me now to get a ‘leveller’ bake I have started baking my cake at a lower temperature, yes it takes longer, but I love the result so much more. My sponge cakes are now baked at 150 degrees in my fan oven and so far so good.
Maybe it’s my oven, maybe I’ve not used them in the right way, but I’m really in the camp that there’s something for everyone, and we can choose whatever works for us, but for me, I really can’t get on with them at all and will stick to my way from now on…
Happy Baking love Caroline xxx
