hey guys Tara honey with ice cream for better training and today we're going to talk about how to get moist cake so this is a problem that I hear a lot and people have trouble with getting their cakes to come out moist and not dry so most the time when I hear about this problem is with scratch cake recipe so that's the time everybody gives a little oil with cake mix cake because that's what the purpose is for cake mix okay is it had all the add ingredients in there to make it come out consistent and boy but a lot of people have trouble with their scratch paint samples so I put together some some chips and some things to think about that I think will really help you and so one caveat I will tell you that I know that some people had an issue with the word moist I don't really have it easy with it but I have a friend who and I have seen other people who don't like to hear the word moist in and described on their nerve so I'm going to give you a warning I use the word moist in this video a lot so just be prepared so let's get on to the juice okay first if you're coming from YouTube I will put a link in the description below for my two favorite scratch cake recipes the first is my favorite vanilla bean cake recipe and the second is my chocolate butter cake both of these are scratch cakes I love the most are very moist and I think you're really going to like them and if you're not coming from YouTube and you're watching this on Facebook or the poster there are links to these two recipes in the post as well tip number one you need real butter stay away from the margarine so first I'm going to tell you to check your butter you may say I am using butter and what I want to tell you is that sometimes they try to trick you in the grocery store so when you're buying better make sure to look and make sure it's actual butter because sometimes the margarine will come and sticks and sometimes it even says on the box right for baking but I'm going to tell you the one that says right for baking sometimes that's not butter and it's actually margarine and margarine has more water content in it and it just doesn't work as well as better so check your butter if your cakes are coming out dry that's the first thing I would do is check and make sure it's it's not margarine that it's actually real butter and then the second thing about butter is you want to make sure most of the recipes call for room-temperature butter and room temperature is great or maybe slightly cooler than room temperature you don't want cold and you don't want to put that butter in the microwave and heat it up and have it all melted that does not work they say room temperature because room-temperature ingredients mix together better alright tip number two is are you measuring your flour correctly so you don't want to pack down your flour when you're measuring it and by that I mean you don't want to take your measuring cup and stick it into the flour bag and measure out a cup of flour that way because you're packing the flour down into your measuring cup so take your measuring cup set it to the side of your flour bag and then take another scoop tip it out of the flour bag and then put it into your measuring cup that way so you're just spooning it into your measuring cup and measure that and then make sure to level off the top so that's how you measure your flour just remember don't pack your flour down into your measuring cup because that's going to be adding too much flour to your cake batter tip number three are you using all egg whites instead of whole eggs now I know that there are some white cake recipes that do call for all egg whites and that's fine if you're having no trouble with those recipes go ahead and keep on using them but if this cake is coming out to dry it could be that it's all egg whites because egg whites are a little drawing when you use whole eggs in place of the egg whites it seems to add a little bit more moisture now there are some cake recipes that you're not going to be able to do this with so if it's like a chiffon cake or something where you're having to beat and whip the egg whites until they're stiff and then fold them into the batter that's a totally different type of recipe you're going to have to continue to use egg whites for that particular cake recipe but for general cakes you can if it's calling for all egg white you can add whole eggs instead of the egg white you don't want to let's say your recipes calling for six egg whites you don't want to add six eggs you're going to completely half that amount so you would use three whole eggs instead of the six egg white you're not going to get a bright white cake but you might get a little bit more moist cake doing it that way tip number four don't over bake especially vanilla cakes and the trick that I use for vanilla cakes is that right before I think they're ready I'll pull them out now if you pull them out too far ahead you're going to set them on your town and then they're going to sink in the middle because they won't be done so obviously you want the middle done but you don't want them Brown too much on the top because the militates are notorious for being dry if you over bake them even just slightly so this is going to take a little bit of trial and error but if you find that you're over baking just whenever you think that they're going to be ready just take them out just slightly before then that just seems to work best for me tip number five stop over mixing so when you're using a cake mix recipe which normally people don't have a problem with the cake mix coming out dry because that's what a cake mix is for you're supposed to get a consistent product every time and usually they do come out moist because they've got all the other additives and ingredients in the box but if you're using a scratch cake you do not want to mix it like you're going to mix a cake box cake you have to follow the instructions if it tells you to mix it for one minute mix it for one minute but you don't want to pulverize it where you're not seeing any kind of lumps or anything in your cake better you want to just completely follow the instructions as they're written if you over mix your scratch cake batter you could end up with a cake that is way too dense a flat cakes a cake that doesn't rise properly it can be sort of a gummy consistency you could have these glue light streaks in it you can have sort of little tunnels in it there's all kinds of things that can happen if you over mix and the texture is just not going to be right and obviously it's not going to be moist it's going to have just a weird texture so I always try to tell people if you're doing something if you're banking from scratch try to stop yourself from over mixing the batter tip number six it's not always your fault so how can it just give you an excuse here sometimes it's really not your fault you have followed the instructions exactly you have used the mixing method that the instructions told you to use and everything you have done is exactly the way you were supposed to but the recipe the cake is still just not coming out correctly it could actually be the recipe sometimes it is I always try to tell people follow the instructions exactly how they're written and if you tried a couple of times you know that you are using all butter you're not packing down your flour you haven't overbaked it it's still not working out it could be the recipe you might just need to try a different recipe and that's okay too tip number seven is say yes to sour cream and a lot of people when they hear the cake recipe has sour cream in it they if they don't like sour cream a lot you well it doesn't take like sour cream obviously the sour cream is so much thicker it gives the cake a really moist consistency it really makes for a smooth texture of cake and I love using sour cream most of my recipes call for sour cream because to me it really makes for a soft consistency moist cake tip number eight cakes calling for oil seem to be more moist now I will say that not all cake recipes call for oil obviously but a lot of the fruitcakes such as and I don't mean fruitcake as in like the door stoppers for Christmas but I mean cakes that are like carrot cake or the Apple cakes zucchini cakes and banana cakes things like that say a lot of those call for oil and it really makes the cake more moist but some cakes you really don't want that in there so for example vanilla cakes I really haven't found a vanilla cake that just calls for oil that I really care for and it's because the fruit cakes seem to have a stronger flavor because of the fruit that's coming out and they can sort of overcome that oil taste but a vanilla cake is such a light flavor vanilla cakes taste much better when you've got butter recipe and again you can find that recipe for my favorite vanilla bean cake in the blog post or in the description below and it actually does call for butter tip number nine is you can try a simple syrup and the simple syrup is just equal parts of water and sugar and it's boiled together and it's just a liquid and you're just going to spray it over your cake layers or you're going to put it in sort of a squeeze bottle and then squeeze it over the top of your cake layers you want it to soak in a little bit before you then add the buttercream on the top of it and I have heard a lot of people like to use a simple syrup and sometimes they like to infuse different flavors into their simple syrup I don't use this method a lot but I have heard a lot of people really love it tip number ten is your cake really dry or is it dis cold okay I'm not trying to be condescending here I'm being serious sort of but I have had people and I'm on some of these cakes for him sometimes and they do have clients who say the cake was dry but we're really what happened was that the cake was cold because it was in the refrigerator so when they brought it out they cut it and started to eat it well if you've got a butter cake cakes better made with butter they're notorious for getting firmer and a little bit harder because they're in the fridge because it's got butter in it so when you pull it out of the fridge let it sit there for a while and come to room temperature obviously if you've got a cake that has perishable fillings and things in it you don't want to just leave it out but you wanted to come to room temperature then cut it and eat it because if you're eating a cold cake it's the consistency or the texture is more firm and it's going to taste dry but it's not actually dry it's just cold so try that just see if you're trying to eat it cold and if so let it come to room temperature and see if that makes a difference all right and the last I just want to tell you to always follow the instructions in the cake recipe follow them to a tee because they matter the temperature the ingredient matter and the mixing method matters if they're telling you to alternate between the dry and the wet ingredients when you're mixing do that if they're telling you to use the reverse creaming method use that says it matters in what order you're going to add your ingredients and mix them together because the person who has written the recipe knows how best to add the ingredients together for the optimal outcome so before adding you anything or subbing out ingredients always follow the directions the way they're written first and then you can go back and kind of fiddle with flavors and things like that okay and finally don't forget to grab those two recipes I told you about the favorite vanilla bean cake and the chocolate butter cake they're really good really moist and just like I said they're just my favorites so I'll put a link to those in the blog post and they're also in the description if you're watching this from YouTube alright I hope this was helpful to you and if you have some tips that I may have missed I'd love to hear oh and if you try either one of those two recipes I recommended I'd love to hear what you thought okay I'll see you next time