Bakery and Confectionary

BAKERY AND CONFECTIONARY FDNT 315 3 (1+2)

Lesson 10:Cakes

Cake faults and causes

Faults	Causes
Sinking of fruits	Weak or insufficient flour.
	Insufficient egg.
	Too light mixing. Over creaming. Insufficient mixing.
	Cool oven resulting in slow baking.
	Fruit too heavy. Very wet not dry Syrup not removed.
	Insufficient acid in batter.
	Too much baking powder.
	Cake mixture too thin.
	Fruit added before flour.
Collapsed / Sunken cake (Shape fault)	Baking tin disturbed or moved in the oven while baking, Drop in temperature due to frequent opening of the door of oven.
	Too much liquid, baking powder, under baking.
	Checking too early for doneness, excess sugar.
Peaked / humped cake (Shape faults)	Insufficient fat and excess baking powder.
	Oven temperature too high.
	Too small a tin for the batter.
	Too strong flour, too much egg.
Heavy cake (Structural faults)	Too little baking powder, too much flour.
	Mixture not creamed enough and flour mixed too vigorously, over handling.
	Oven temperature too low / slow.
Dry and Crumbly cake (Structural faults)	Too much baking powder or flour.
	Not enough fat and liquid.
	No egg or too little egg.
	Insufficient egg in relation to fat.
Cracked top (Structural fault)	Over baking – Too long in the oven, Oven too hot.
	Cake tin too small.
	Too much flour, insufficient liquid.
Sticky top	Humidity – crust collects moisture from the air and becomes sticky – especially if they are high in sugar.
	Insufficient cooling – stored when it still warm.
	Under baked or oven temperature too low. Thin batter – excess liquid / moistening agent.
Cake sticks to pan	Pan / tin not greased and dusted properly.
	Delay in moulding – cake left in the pan too long.
Coarse texture, holes and tunnels (Faulty structure and texture)	Under baking.
	Oven too hot.
	Improper mixing.
	Bad scaling.
	Insufficient action.
Tender crumb (Faulty Texture)	Too much fat in relation to egg.
Discoloured crumb	Badly balanced baking powder – excess alkali.
Cake with flat top (Shape fault)	Too much baking powder or sugar.