How to Bake Perfect Cakes: Four Steps to Perfect Cakes Every Time

Say goodbye to puffy cake tops with my four-step guide to baking perfect cakes. With this guide, you’ll have flat tops, even layers, and a cake that drops out of your pan without a crumb missing every time.

I bake a layered cake about once a month and over time I’ve honed my baking process to ensure I have perfect cakes with every bake. For me, perfect cakes mean flat tops, even layers, and a fully intact cake when I flip them out of the cake pans.

Although flat cake tops may not be high up on your perfect cakes quality list, I’ve found them to be life-changing. Having a flat cake top makes stacking the cakes much easier. It also means you don’t have to cut the tops off which can weaken the structure of the cake and creates less waste since the puffy cake top is often discarded once sliced off. If you use my 4-step guide to perfect cakes, I promise you’ll get even, flat, thick cakes with every bake.

Before you start, my recommendation is to calibrate your oven temperature.  If you’ve never done it, here’s a handy guide! 

STEP 1: PREP YOUR PAN

Here’s my method for prepping my cake pan

• Grease
• Flour
• Line

The first thing you do to ensure perfect cakes is grease your cake pan. I like to use or butter for greasing my pan. I don’t recommend using vegetable oil or the all-in-one ‘made for bakers’ can that claims to grease and flour your cake pan all at once.

With the Crisco or butter, I simply slather some on a paper towel and rub it into every crevice of the cake pan, all the way to the rim.  It doesn’t need to be a heavy coating just enough so it looks greasy without leaving globs of Crisco or butter visible on the pan.

Next, grab some flour (or cocoa powder for chocolate cakes) and dump about 3 tablespoons of the flour into each greased cake pan. Gently shake the flour all over the pan so every inch that you just covered in Crisco is now covered in flour. I usually do this over the sink or garbage for easy cleanup.  If you see the flour isn’t sticking to a portion of your cake pan, simply add a little more Crisco to that area and shake again with flour. Dump out any extra, gently tapping the cake pan so there’s nothing left floating around.

Lastly, cut a piece of parchment paper to fit the bottom of your cake pan and place it on the bottom. If the parchment seems to roll up on you when you place it in the pan, add a little Crisco to one side and place the greased side down in the pan so the parchment stays in place. The parchment will help ensure your perfect cakes release from the pan without issue.

STEP 2: WRAP YOUR CAKE PAN

This sound silly and I honestly thought were a hoax until I tried it. My first time using the strips I was so impressed and I haven’t baked a cake without them since.

Here’s what I do — after I prep my pan with flour and parchment I fill a big bowl with cool water from the tap. I fully emerge my cake strips and I let them soak while I make the cake batter.

Once the batter’s made, I remove the cake strips from the water, wring them out thoroughly and tightly wrap the empty pans before filling them with batter. That’s it, cake strips are really so simple and they’re key to perfect cakes.

STEP 3: WEIGH YOUR BATTER

If you’re making multiple cakes you need to weigh your batter to ensure your cakes are even in size when they bake. If you’re just making one single cake in one cake pan, you can skip this step and head straight to the oven and bake your cakes.

When it comes time to separate your batter into different pans, . Place one prepared cake pan from Step 1 on the kitchen scale, tare the scale to zero then start adding batter.  Add about half the batter to one pan, note the weight on the scale then remove the cake pan.

Put the second prepared cake pan on the scale, tare it to zero then add the same weight in batter to the second pan that you added to the first.  If you still have batter left at this point then repeat the process again — add pan 1 to the scale, tare to zero, add batter, note added weight, repeat and match weight with pan 2 until all batter is gone.  If you go over on one pan a bit just use a spoon to gently transfer the batter to the other cake pan.

Once the batter’s in the pan, you’re ready to bake!

STEP 4: COOL & FLIP

This is a no-brainer but before you even think about removing your cake from the pan let that baby cool completely.

Like seriously. Do not touch it.

I usually let my cakes cool on a wire rack which allows them cool a bit quicker as the air’s able to circulate around the entire cake pan. Once it’s completely cool, I use a small paring knife and run it around the inside perimeter of the cake pan to gently release the cake.

Next, I put the wire rack on top of the cake and flip it over, holding tightly to both the pan and the wire rack. You may need to tap the pan a little but your cake should fall right out. Voila! You have perfect cakes ready for frosting. Just simply remove the parchment paper and you’re good to go.