The Right Flour

• The amount and type of flour both make a difference in your cake's texture. All-purpose flour has more protein than soft cake flour. More protein means more gluten, more toughness and less moisture. Cake flour, on the other hand, is finer than all-purpose flour and can absorb more fat and liquid, keeping your cake moist. Measure the cake flour by spooning it lightly into measuring cups, so you don't add too much and end up drying out your cake.

Just a Spoonful of Real Sugar

• Because bakers in countries such as Germany tend to prefer cakes that are less sweet than American cakes, their cakes taste dry to American palates. If you want your cake to stay moist, don't cut back on the sugar in your recipe or use an artificial sugar for the real thing. The science behind the sugar and moisture connection occurs at the molecular level, with sugar molecules having an ability to bond with the fats and liquids in baked goods.

Know Your Pans and Oven

• Ovens can vary by up to 25 degrees Fahrenheit in either direction, so if you think you've set the oven at 350 F, it may in fact register 375 F and dry out your cake. Use an oven thermometer to see whether your oven runs hot or cold. A dark-colored baking pan can also dry out a cake, because it absorbs more of an oven's infrared radiation than a light-colored pan -- and cooks your cake more quickly than you expect.

Creaming Butter, In Reverse

• If you reverse the order of ingredients in making your cake batter, you keep it more tender with a finer, moister texture, according to the editors of "The Science of Good Cooking." They recommend a process they call reverse creaming, where you add softened butter to the flour mixture in the same way your would for pastry, then add the milk and eggs. This method reduces the air pockets in the cake, keeping it from over-rising and drying out.