A lesson learned

[ksmith]

When the recipe calls for "cake flour", they really really mean it.

Freezing for 3-4 hours and freezing overnight are not the same thing.

Comments

[barbarienne.livejournal.com]

I know I shouldn't laugh--especially at the thought of yummy chocolate baked goods being destroyed by something other than a human digestive system--but I got this mental image of Alton Brown lecturing you on different flours. The episode of Good Eats where he makes brownies was on just a couple of days ago.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Hah. Hah.

;-P

Did he use a messy melted chocolate recipe with cake flour?

Mom used all-purpose all her cooking life. I never knew there were different types. Never tried baking all that much until now. Call it learning by doing, and making a mess in the process.

I did look for cake flour when I went shopping, but I couldn't find it at the store I frequent. Figured it wasn't common, so it wasn't needed.

I salvaged everything but the center, but I'm not sure the stuff's edible. I said before that it was the consistency of flourless chocolate cake, all sticky-gooey. I don't believe it's as baked as it should be. The baking times in the newspaper recipes never correlate with the times obtained using my GE Spacemaker range.

[barbarienne.livejournal.com]

Melted chocolate and cake flour, indeed!

I never knew there were different kinds of flour, either, until I started watching Good Eats. Similarly, I never knew that we should weigh our dry ingredients (as the Europeans do) instead of go by volume, because the density changes with humidity.

Baking is really chemistry, and a small screw up can lead to spectacular failures (as you have discovered). Regular cooking is much more forgiving. I'm always impressed by all the old ladies who learned to bake without measuring anything!