Using a Heating Core

• Prepare your 10-inch or larger pan as you would a smaller one. Place a piece of parchment paper cut to the size of the pan in the bottom. Grease and flour the heating core metal insert, both inside and out, and place it in the center of your prepared pan with the hole facing up. Fill the area outside of the heating core with batter, then fill the heating core with a small amount of batter to the same level as the outside. Bake the cake according to your recipe. When the cakes is partly cooled, remove the cake from the pan and from the heating core. Plug the hole in the center of the cake with the piece from the insert and decorate as usual.

Pay Attention to Temperature

• The primary motivation for using a heating core is to achieve even cooking throughout your cake. In addition to using the metal insert for very large cakes, consider dropping the oven temperature by 25 degrees Fahrenheit for the first 20 to 30 minutes of baking time, then raising it to the temperature called for in the recipe for the remaining time. This will result in a slightly longer cooking time but will also help achieve a more evenly cooked cake layer.

Other Options

• If you don't own a heating core, use a small metal measuring cup instead. Simply grease, flour, place and fill the cup in the same manner as you would the heating core. Use a tall enough cup that the cake will not rise higher than the sides during cooking. Alternatively, grease one or several flower nails and place them flat-side down on the bottom of your greased and floured pan, evenly spaced throughout. Poke the nails through the parchment paper so that the spikes are facing up when the batter is poured in. This will eliminate the need to plug the cake while still offering even cooking.

Bake-Even Strips

• As another option, or in combination with a heating core or flower nails, wrap your cake pans with bake-even strips. Dampen the fabric strips with water and wrap them around the outside of your prepared pan before filling it with batter. The moisture in the strips prevents the edges from browning too much and cools the outside, allowing the center to cook fully without the outside getting overcooked. Additionally, the even cooking caused by the strips results in a more level cake.