Three rookie mistakes to avoid while baking a red velvet cake for the first time.
They say baking needs a whole lot of patience and resilience. But then like most good things in life the process changes you and the ending is sure sweet. Why else would someone as restless as me embark on a journey that takes hours, and requires so much precision in the kitchen? For a non-sweet tooth to be hooked to a hobby like baking is somewhat unnatural because my reward is clearly not the food I am creating. But the beauty and the elegance I find in baking is magical and somehow pushes me to create things I am never going to eat. Here is one of my all-time muse -The eternally gorgeous red velvet cake.
Now, as simple as it may look, it takes a few hours to actually put this together. Adding the fact this is the third cake I have made in my life, ever, yes it has not been easy at all. But ever since I started baking, I have always had this dream of baking a perfect red velvet cake, and I just went for it last Sunday.
There are so many reasons why I love red velvet cake. First of all, it does not have chocolate, yes it has cocoa, but barely there. Secondly, it is just SO gorgeous to look at. Lastly – CREAM CHEESE FROSTING. It is hands down my fav kinds frosting, even for a non-sweet-tooth.
Now there are a million recipes on the internet and I am not going to write one here. But I definitely think people who are baking the red velvet for the first time can learn from my mistakes.
Shape matters.
Do not try to become a shape expert when you are starting out, just buy the damn cake pan. Baking isn’t easy, and if you are just starting out, do not make this hard on yourself. There are ways to make heart shapes by cutting a round and a square cake, but the easiest way is to just buy the heart shaped mould. I got mine from Amazon for really cheap and I loved the experience.
I used the gel colouring as suggested by many, because it prevents your batter from getting diluted as compared to the liquid alternative. My first batch, I did not add the required amount of colouring that made for a lacklustre brown coloured cake which fixed in my second batch. This will take some trial and error, but aim for rich raspberry red colour from your batter, and don’t make dual coloured cakes like I did. It’s really silly.
My biggest sense of discontentment about this entire cake has been the fact that despite all my effort and hard work, my frosting turned runny, and I could do nothing to salvage it. I bought the most expensive ingredients, made sure everything was in optimal room temperature but I still ended up with frosting that trickled down the sides of my cake like vanilla syrup. I read up a lot on all the possible theories and here are some suggestions for you guys to keep in mind- Separate the liquid part of your cream cheese before you mix it, add only the solid block. Do not overbeat the frosting, and lastly try to frost your cake at a slightly bearable temperature than on one of the hottest days of Chennai summers. 🙁
As the one making it, though I know my cake has so many flaws, It still tasted delicious and made many people happy at home and at work. Learning is a beautiful process and with every flaw, comes the excitement of figuring out why it didn’t work. Maybe that is why baking is such a beautiful process of connecting with yourself and has got me hooked. Oh, to be honest here, I enjoy photography as much as enjoy the cooking itself.
Hope my rookie mistakes prevent you from making yours. Now go bake some cake! 🙂
