Surgery topic 1: Cupcake cases coming away from the cakes

The Doctor will see you now....!

After offering some advice on Simon Mayo’s Drive Time show on Radio 2 a few weeks ago I’ve had some requests to hold a cupcake baking surgery. Feel free to email me your questions to yum@rachaelskitchen.co.uk and I’ll do my best to answer them. If you’ve got something to add to any of my suggestions I’d love to hear from you and I’ll post them here.

Surgery item 1: Cupcake cases coming away from the cakes.

There are several possible reasons for this...

1. The method: There are basically 2 methods of making a plain vanilla cupcake depending on the ingredients. Creaming method - using butter, and All-in-one method – using soft margarine. All-in-one method has the advantage of being quick, easy and moist, with little chance of disasters. However, margarine behaves in a different way to butter and melts at a lower temperature. If you are using the All-in-one method you don’t beat as much air into the mixture, meaning the consistency is less light and airy - and softer. When your All-in-one method cupcakes are baking in the oven they should rise up nicely but they have a slightly fragile structure. This can cause the cakes to shrink away from their cases once you take them out of the oven to cool. You can help combat this by adding a little more cake mixture (a good dessert spoonful in total), baking the cakes for a little longer and making sure you pop them straight out of the baking tins and onto a cooling rack. Be careful not to burn yourself!
2. Your oven: All ovens vary and as long as you know where the cool/hot spots are in your oven you can still make successful cakes. The type of heat you have can have a huge effect on how your cakes turn out. Gas gives a wet heat – which I think is perfect for cakes and some pastries. However, if your cakes are coming away from their cases the wet heat of a gas oven could be contributing to this. If you turn the temperature up a tiny bit and make sure the kitchen isn’t too hot and damp/humid when you take the cakes out of the oven this should help.
3. Kitchen conditions: If you are having a baking session the kitchen can get very warm and humid. If you can keep the room well aired and a comfortable temperature this should help.