Baking Tips for the Non-Baker

Everyone loves delicious baked goods, fresh from the oven. For those who regularly bake, it’s only a matter of getting in the kitchen, pulling ingredients, and getting started. We have long since learned the art of baking by instinct, feel, and sight.

But what about those who approach their ovens with skepticism, and then, only once or twice a year? These folks haven’t honed those instincts and get frustrated when the cookies come out flat, or the bread doesn’t rise. If you are someone who doesn’t bake, yet wants to learn how, this podcast is designed to give you a few tips to get started.

Transcript

Everyone loves delicious baked goods, fresh from the oven. For those who regularly bake, it’s only a matter of getting in the kitchen, pulling ingredients, and getting started. We have long since learned the art of baking by instinct, feel, and sight.

But what about those who approach their ovens with skepticism, and then, only once or twice a year? These are the ones who haven’t honed those instincts and get frustrated when the cookies come out flat, or the bread doesn’t rise. If you are someone who doesn’t bake, yet wants to learn how, here are a few tips to get you started:

Let’s look at the ingredients first. Most baked goods call for basic – or ‘dry’ ingredients like flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Bakers often restock these items, as they are the most used. But for the non-baker, these same items may sit on your pantry shelf for years, and only be moved when they are in the way. 

These are also items that can go ‘bad’. It’s not that they spoil or grow mold, but they can lose their ‘powers’. If left in a damp space, they will clump. If left out in the open air, they absorb air-borne odors, dust, and grease. For long-term, infrequent use, store these ingredients in the freezer. Salt and sugar can be kept indefinitely on the pantry shelf, but only if stored in airtight containers. There may be some clumping, but a good stir with a fork will break it up. 

Flour may also have Mediterranean Moths or their eggs in the bag. But don’t think it’s because you stored it improperly. They were already in the bag when you purchased it. Left alone for even a day or two, these eggs hatch into a moth, and those moths spin webs. Don’t worry, though. The eggs aren’t harmful to humans. However, the larvae can be gross, and the moths and their webs are a headache. 

If your flour is saturated with larvae, moths, or webs, it’s time to toss it. But it’s best to prevent that from happening by storing it properly as soon as you bring it home. This is what I mean by storing it properly.

Flour in paper bags can absorb freezer odors, and easily freezer burn. For this reason, it needs to be either stored in glass or plastic containers. I buy the 2-gallon zip top bags and place the entire, unopened bag of flour in them. I then place it in the freezer for no less than 2 days before I open and use it. As I use the flour, I keep it in the original bag, and use a clothespin to secure the top. Then I push as much air out of the zip top bag as possible before sealing it.

With all powdered ingredients, store them in a glass or plastic tightly sealed and labeled container. 

Yeast should be treated the same way. Most people purchase the type in pre-measured envelopes. As an avid bread baker, I buy commercial-size blocks. To store it, I keep the unopened packages in the freezer. Opened bags are poured into a glass jar with a tight-fitting lid and stored in the freezer. A super clean mayonnaise jar will work as well if you buy your yeast in bulk. If you buy the envelopes, put them unopened in a zip top bag before placing them in the freezer.

With all dry ingredients stored in the freezer, be sure to bring them to room temperature before using. 

For brown sugar, you need a certain amount of moisture to keep it from drying out and becoming rock hard. Use a moisture controlling disk to keep the levels where they need to be. Before these disks became available, Mom would add a small piece of fresh bread and put it on top of the brown sugar in the canister. It worked great. How this worked, I don’t really know. But I still prefer the disks, because as the bread dries out, it leaves crumbs in the sugar.

Now, about butter. Many recipes call for ‘softened’ butter. There is a simple trick to knowing when it is soft enough. Stick your thumb on it. If you cannot press down, it is too cold. If the butter squirts out of the wrapper, or leaks out in liquid form, it’s too warm. Once butter begins to melt, it separates. The oil in the too soft or melted butter can drastically alter your dough. When it comes to ‘softened’ butter, you want to be able to make an imprint in it, but not be able to push all the way through.

One of the first steps in baking requires you to ‘whip’ your butter. This means few to no large lumps. Once it is whipped, it becomes a pale yellow in color and appears to be smooth. But over whipping it can cause it to start to separate. To help prevent this, I begin by chilling my bowl for a few minutes in the refrigerator. 

Let’s talk for just a second about unsalted and Salted butter. Unsalted contains no salt, just as it says. Salted has salt added as a preservative. When a recipe calls for ‘unsalted’, it takes into consideration additional salt in the recipe. 

Too much salt can alter the way the other ingredients act and react with each other or can affect the flavors. If all you have on hand is ‘salted’, you can lower the additional salt by up to one-half. But in the long run, it is better to buy the appropriate butter. It is definitely quicker and easier.

Eggs are another ingredient frequently called for when baking. As with all ingredients, the fresher the better. Did you know that eggs purchased in the grocery store could easily be as much as five weeks old? My questions on those are: Where have they been? How have they been stored? I am fortunate to be able to walk out my back door and get eggs as fresh as they come – just laid. For those of you who don’t have that luxury, here is how to test the freshness of your eggs:

Fill the sink or a large bowl with water. Add the eggs straight from the carton. Those that float are older and although they can be used, they can be questionable for some recipes. Those that sink are good to use. 

When a recipe calls for 2 eggs, beaten, what they mean is, crack the eggs into a small bowl. Using a fork, very lightly mix the yolk and white together. The purpose of this is to allow the egg white and yolk to blend evenly into your dough. 

Now that you have a handle on the ingredients, let’s talk about the directions. 

When using flour in a recipe, it is meant to be light. As it travels from manufacturer to the store shelves to your pantry, it settles and packs down. Sifting breaks up this packing and returns it to its lighter stage. 

If I am baking bread, I pour flour into a bowl, and briskly stir it with a fork or whisk before measuring. But with cookies and other baked goods, use your sifter.

Recipes will often tell you to sift some of your dry ingredients together. To do this, sift your flour into a bowl first, then measure out how much you need. Add the other dry ingredients, then sift them together. I often sift my flour first, measure it out into a mixing bowl, then add the other dry ingredients that should be sifted in with the flour. Rather than use my sifter, I use a whisk. 

Seasoned bakers may use the same whisk method for blending dry ingredients. But these are folks who know instinctively how the blended ingredients should look and feel. For a non-baker, you may want to use your sifter the first few times until you get familiar with the process.

When it comes to vanilla, some recipes have you add it at the very end. I add it with my liquid ingredients to ensure it is fully blended. If in doubt, follow the recipe. My thought is that by adding it last, it just puts you in a position to blend it longer. We’ll talk about that more in a moment.

If you are using candies, nuts, or fruits in a recipe, here are some tips that may be helpful:

Add chocolate chips and candies to the mix by hand. A mixer tends to break these more fragile pieces. Raisins can be blended with a mixer, but just make sure they are fresh. 

Nuts can be blended with a mixer, but as with raisins, you want them as fresh as possible. If you have nuts in the freezer, check to make sure they aren’t freezer burned, and still have good flavor. Nuts contain oils, which can make them dry out or lose flavor, if left in the open air. Some fruits, such as fresh apples and pears, should be pretreated in fruit fresh or lemon juice before adding to a recipe. This prevents them from turning brown.

Other fruits, such as blueberries and cherries, should be well drained before adding them to a recipe. Otherwise, the batter may be too wet. A simple trick is to add them while still slightly frozen and toss them in a very light dusting of flour first. This prevents your muffins or bread from getting too wet or turning colors from the berry juice.

Now for a few miscellaneous tips. Get rid of the heavy hand. Cakes, cookies, and other baked goods can become heavy and tough if overmixed. Once the dry ingredients meet the wet ingredients, it is time to mix the two together literally just until blended. If using a mixer, you may want to mix for one minute or less or use a ‘pulsing’ (or on/off) mix cycle. Unless it is a thick, heavy batter, you may also want to mix by hand at this point. And stir from the bottom, to make sure you get all of the dry ingredients mixed in.

If you are a non-baker, I would suggest you start with something simple, like cookies or muffins. Learn the tricks. Have a perfectly straight edge to level your flour and dry ingredients in the measuring cup or spoon.

Keep two sets of measuring utensils – one for wet, and one for dry. This prevents you from having to wash and dry them before reusing for the next ingredient.

For the non-bakers, I hope this clears up some of the frustration and confusion when baking. For the seasoned bakers, I hope this gives you at least one tip you can use. And for both of you, please save me some cookies. I promise to share my lemonade with you!!! 

If you want to learn more about the topic at hand just visit my website at www.thefarmwife.com/ . 

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Thanks again for stopping in. I will see you next week on Living a Simple Life with a Back Porch View. And while you are waiting for the next episode, grab that glass of refreshment, pull up a rocker, and sit back for a while. It’s time to relax and enjoy.