A cake is a sweetened bread that is baked in a tin. French cuisine codifies cakes, or gâteaux , as deriving from eight basic doughs with flavourings like marzipan , sugar icing, spices, fruits, and cremes. In the United States, there are three common methods for making cakes: * Conventional * Quick-dump * Muffin Cakes can be either shortened or unshortened. Spongecake and angel food cake are examples of unshortened mixtures that depend on incorporated air for leavening. Chemical reactants can also be added as a leavening source. Flour, water, and leavening agents give bakery products their texture and flavour. Wheat flour is unique because its protein forms an elastic network that holds gas and develops a spongy structure when baked.

What are the main ingredients used to make a cake?

The primary ingredients that give most baked goods their signature look, feel, and taste are flour , water, and leavening agents . Other ingredients like eggs, milk, salt, shortening , and sugar can modify these characteristics, and other minor ingredients can be added as well. Many cakes rely on chemical reactants to create gas for leavening . These cakes consist of flour, gluten proteins, and less-extensible protein in the flour.

How do you bake a simple cake?

Cakes are sweetened breads that come in a variety of forms, typically baked in a shaped tin. A simple cake can be made using the quick-dump, or one-bowl, method, where all ingredients except the leavening agent are mixed vigorously in a bowl, preferably with a power mixer. Then, the leavening agent is added, and mixing is completed. As a modification, eggs and part of the milk can be added separately. In layer cakes, maintaining formula balance, or the correct proportioning of ingredients, is important. For every 10 parts of flour, yellow layer cakes should have 10 to 16 parts sugar by weight, while white layer cakes should have 11 to 16 parts sugar. Shortening should range from 3 to 7 parts for each 10 parts of flour.

What are some common types of cakes?

Cakes come in a variety of forms, with different preparation methods and flavors. French cuisine codifies cakes, or gâteaux , into eight basic doughs with varied flavorings like fruits, spices, and marzipan. Butter cakes use shortening, as opposed to sponge cakes. Devil's food cake is a dark chocolate layer cake that uses a high amount of baking soda, which makes the cake darker and fluffy. Cheesecake is a creamy dessert with cheese, eggs, and sugar over a thin crust. A rich cake found throughout Europe is the torte, which often contains nuts, fruit, creme, and chocolate.

How are cakes decorated or flavored differently around the world?

Cakes are globally diverse in flavor and decoration, often linked to cultural celebrations. In France, cakes, or gâteaux , come from eight basic doughs with varied flavorings like marzipan and spices. The torte , a rich, multi-layered cake with nuts and chocolate, is popular in Europe. In the United States, methods range from creaming sugar and fat to quick-dump techniques. English cakes involve rubbing-in fat or creaming methods, adjusting richness and baking temperatures. King cakes are also found around the world. The Louisiana-style king cake is a cinnamon brioche with icing and colored sugar. French galette des rois is a puff pastry with almond paste, while southern France's gâteau des rois is a brioche with candied fruit. Spain's roscón de reyes is flavored with orange-blossom water and topped with candied fruit. Mexico’s rosca de reyes includes guava or quince paste. Swiss and German Dreikönigskuchen features brioche rolls flavored with vanilla and lemon. Bulgaria's banitsa is a savory phyllo dough with cheese and charms. Portugal’s bolo-rei is a ring-shaped cake with cherry, lemon, and nuts.

What special roles do cakes play in celebrations and traditions?

Cakes often play special roles in celebrations and traditions. For instance, the wedding cake tradition comes from the Roman confarreatio , where couples ate a cake made of salt, water, and flour. Similarly, throughout Europe and the United States, specific cakes are linked with particular celebrations, such as the French Twelfth Night cake and the U.S. Christmas fruitcake. King cake is a sweet pastry served from Epiphany through Shrove Tuesday, especially during Mardi Gras in the U.S. A trinket is often hidden inside, and the recipient is named "king" or "queen" and hosts the next party. Birthday cake is for a birthday celebration.

cake

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A chef sprinkles chocolate over a white frosted cake topped with cherries.

A square piece of sticky toffee pudding sits in a pool of glossy toffee sauce, topped with a dollop of cream and a decorative caramel curl, served in a white bowl.

The art of making traditional Viennese cakes

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Related Topics:: gingerbread; Yule log; Danish pastry; layer cake; high-ratio cake

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cake

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Also known as: gateau

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Top Questions

What is a cake?
A cake is a sweetened bread that is baked in a tin. French cuisine codifies cakes, or gâteaux, as deriving from eight basic doughs with flavourings like marzipan, sugar icing, spices, fruits, and cremes.

In the United States, there are three common methods for making cakes:
* Conventional
* Quick-dump
* Muffin

Cakes can be either shortened or unshortened. Spongecake and angel food cake are examples of unshortened mixtures that depend on incorporated air for leavening. Chemical reactants can also be added as a leavening source. Flour, water, and leavening agents give bakery products their texture and flavour. Wheat flour is unique because its protein forms an elastic network that holds gas and develops a spongy structure when baked.
3 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What are the main ingredients used to make a cake?
The primary ingredients that give most baked goods their signature look, feel, and taste are flour, water, and leavening agents. Other ingredients like eggs, milk, salt, shortening, and sugar can modify these characteristics, and other minor ingredients can be added as well.

Many cakes rely on chemical reactants to create gas for leavening. These cakes consist of flour, gluten proteins, and less-extensible protein in the flour.
5 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How do you bake a simple cake?
Cakes are sweetened breads that come in a variety of forms, typically baked in a shaped tin. A simple cake can be made using the quick-dump, or one-bowl, method, where all ingredients except the leavening agent are mixed vigorously in a bowl, preferably with a power mixer. Then, the leavening agent is added, and mixing is completed. As a modification, eggs and part of the milk can be added separately.

In layer cakes, maintaining formula balance, or the correct proportioning of ingredients, is important. For every 10 parts of flour, yellow layer cakes should have 10 to 16 parts sugar by weight, while white layer cakes should have 11 to 16 parts sugar. Shortening should range from 3 to 7 parts for each 10 parts of flour.
2 Britannica Sources
1. cake
2. baking: Cakes
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What are some common types of cakes?
Cakes come in a variety of forms, with different preparation methods and flavors. French cuisine codifies cakes, or gâteaux, into eight basic doughs with varied flavorings like fruits, spices, and marzipan.

Butter cakes use shortening, as opposed to sponge cakes. Devil's food cake is a dark chocolate layer cake that uses a high amount of baking soda, which makes the cake darker and fluffy. Cheesecake is a creamy dessert with cheese, eggs, and sugar over a thin crust. A rich cake found throughout Europe is the torte, which often contains nuts, fruit, creme, and chocolate.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How are cakes decorated or flavored differently around the world?
Cakes are globally diverse in flavor and decoration, often linked to cultural celebrations. In France, cakes, or gâteaux, come from eight basic doughs with varied flavorings like marzipan and spices. The torte, a rich, multi-layered cake with nuts and chocolate, is popular in Europe.

In the United States, methods range from creaming sugar and fat to quick-dump techniques. English cakes involve rubbing-in fat or creaming methods, adjusting richness and baking temperatures.

King cakes are also found around the world. The Louisiana-style king cake is a cinnamon brioche with icing and colored sugar. French galette des rois is a puff pastry with almond paste, while southern France's gâteau des rois is a brioche with candied fruit. Spain's roscón de reyes is flavored with orange-blossom water and topped with candied fruit. Mexico’s rosca de reyes includes guava or quince paste. Swiss and German Dreikönigskuchen features brioche rolls flavored with vanilla and lemon. Bulgaria's banitsa is a savory phyllo dough with cheese and charms. Portugal’s bolo-rei is a ring-shaped cake with cherry, lemon, and nuts.
2 Britannica Sources
1. cake
2. king cake: King cakes around the world
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What special roles do cakes play in celebrations and traditions?
Cakes often play special roles in celebrations and traditions. For instance, the wedding cake tradition comes from the Roman confarreatio, where couples ate a cake made of salt, water, and flour. Similarly, throughout Europe and the United States, specific cakes are linked with particular celebrations, such as the French Twelfth Night cake and the U.S. Christmas fruitcake. King cake is a sweet pastry served from Epiphany through Shrove Tuesday, especially during Mardi Gras in the U.S. A trinket is often hidden inside, and the recipient is named "king" or "queen" and hosts the next party. Birthday cake is for a birthday celebration.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

cake, in general, any of a variety of breads, shortened or unshortened, usually shaped by the tin in which it is baked, or, more specifically, a sweetened bread, often rich or delicate.

In the codified cuisine of France, all cakes, or gâteaux, derive from one of eight basic doughs: short pastry, flake pastry, sweet pastry, savarin, brioche, baba, chou pastry, and genoise. To these are added an infinite variety of flavouring and decorative ingredients, such as marzipan, sugar icing, spices, fruits, and cremes.

The torte is a very rich cake found throughout Europe, often of numerous thin layers and containing nuts, fruit, creme, and chocolate in combination. The claim to invention of the world-famous chocolate Sachertorte is disputed between two Vienna hotels.

Slices of lemon pie topped with meringue.

Britannica Quiz

Baking and Baked Goods Quiz

In the United States, cakes usually are made by one of three methods. In the conventional method the sugar and fat are creamed together, the egg added, and a mixture of flour, salt, and baking powder mixed in alternately with the liquid, beginning and ending with dry ingredients. In the quick-dump, or one-bowl, method, all the ingredients except the leavening agent are put into a bowl and mixed vigorously (preferably with a power mixer), the leavening agent added, and mixing completed. As a modification of the method, the eggs and part of the milk may be added as a separate stage. The muffin method involves adding the combined liquid ingredients to the combined dry ingredients; but, although rapid and easy, this method unmodified produces a cake that tends to be coarse-textured and to have poor keeping quality. Chiffon cake is made by a modification of the muffin method in which the egg white is beaten separately and blended with the other mixed ingredients. Shortened cakes made by these methods can be baked in flat layer pans, in loaf pans, or in individual cups and can be baked at oven temperatures of 350–400 °F (177–204 °C).

sticky toffee puddingSticky toffee pudding consisting of a dark sponge cake (with the key ingredient of chopped dates) soaked with sweet toffee sauce.

English cake recipes using fat are of two main types. The rubbing-in method can be used for most mixtures in which the amount of fat is not more than half the amount of flour by weight. The fat is rubbed into the sifted flour, salt, and leavening agent until the mixture is like fine bread crumbs; sugar and other dry ingredients such as dried fruit are added next, followed by beaten eggs together with any other liquid in the recipe. For satisfactory results, the ingredients must be mixed thoroughly but without beating or overmixing. The creaming method is used when the proportion of fat to flour is half or more by weight, thus producing rich cakes. The fat and sugar are creamed well together, the egg beaten into this mixture, and sifted flour and salt, together with raising agent if necessary, folded carefully in, followed by dried fruit and any liquid in the recipe. Baking temperatures vary from 290 °F (143 °C) for very rich fruit cakes to 425 °F (218 °C) for small buns.

Spongecake and angel food cake are examples of unshortened mixtures. These cakes depend largely upon incorporated air for leavening, and, unless modified recipes are used, chemical raising agents are unnecessary, sufficient air to produce a light product being incorporated by whisking the eggs. In angel food cake, only the white of egg is used, beaten with cream of tartar, which is acidic and tends to stabilize the egg-white foam; the blended flour, sugar, and salt then are gently folded in and the desired flavouring added. A portion of the sugar may be beaten with the egg whites. When making sponge cake, two methods are possible: in the first, the unseparated eggs are whisked with the sugar and any flavouring, and the sifted flour is then cut and folded into this thick, light mixture; in the second, the egg yolks are beaten with lemon juice and all or part of the sugar, and the egg whites are beaten separately, with or without part of the sugar, the flour and salt being added to the yolk mixture and the whole combined with the beaten whites. Baking temperatures for unshortened cakes range from 300 to 450 °F (149 to 232 °C), the higher temperatures being used for thin products such as Swiss rolls. Cake flour or pastry flour gives lighter, finer-grained, and more tender cakes than do stronger flours, which are used for breadmaking.

Throughout Europe and the United States, particular cakes are associated with particular celebrations—e.g., the French Twelfth Night cake, the German Easter torte, and the Christmas fruitcake of the United States. The nature of the wedding cake, traditional throughout the West, varies from country to country.

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