Ingredients

• Use fresh ingredients, including leveners, for a fluffy cake texture. Work with Grade-A eggs and check freshness by placing them in a bowl of water. If the egg sinks, it’s fresh. Test the freshness of baking powder and baking soda by adding a small amount of baking soda to enough white vinegar to dissolve the baking soda and looking for bubbles as the two ingredients are mixed. If there aren’t any bubbles, then you need to replace the baking soda. Use the same technique for baking powder, but instead of vinegar use water. Don’t substitute milk with sour cream, because this creates a denser cake texture.

Temperature

• Bring ingredients to room temperature, including eggs and butter. Remove them from the refrigerator at least 30 to 60 minutes before using in your recipe, but only remove the amount of ingredients you need to avoid wasting or contaminating products.

Mixing

• Cream the ingredients until they are light and the butter has turned pale yellow; this should take 5 to 7 minutes. The “creaming” stage of a recipe is when you beat sugar and butter together until light and fluffy, and this is what establishes the amount of air you’ll have in your cake batter. Place egg whites on top of the batter before folding, if your recipe calls to fold egg whites into your batter. Fold by gently scraping from the middle out to the side and back in again. Never mix egg whites into your batter, because you will deflate them and lose your light texture.

Flour

• Use cake flour in your recipe for a lighter texture. Buy cake flour at any grocery store, but instead of stocking up on an ingredient that you will use only in cakes, make your own. Use 1 cup of all-purpose flour and 2 teaspoons of cornstarch for every 1 cup of all-purpose flour the recipe called for. You can use all-purpose flour, but it can weigh down the batter. This is because all-purpose flour has a 10- to 11-percent protein content while cake flour has an 8 percent protein content.

Baking

• Place your cake in the middle rack in the center of the oven. Don’t overcrowd the oven with numerous cake pans. To avoid hotspots or uneven cooking, rotate your cake half way through the baking process. Don’t open the oven door until you’ve reached the halfway mark, because a sudden rush of cool air can deflate your cake and create a dense texture. When testing your cake for doneness, insert a toothpick in the center. If the cake is done, the toothpick should come out slightly crumbed. A toothpick that comes out clean means you’ve over baked your cake. You can test the doneness of a cake by pressing a finger lightly on the top of the cake. If the cake springs back quickly, it is done.