I love to bake. At home, I spend countless hours in my kitchen concocting creations from Pinterest or my mom and grandmother’s recipes. I sat here looking for blog inspiration while eating a cupcake and looking into the science it took to get here only seems appropriate
.
Any variation in a recipe – from too much flour to not enough vanilla – can make the “experiment” (also known as cupcakes) go horribly wrong. Yael Vodovotz, a food science professor at Ohio State (this pains me to reference) says that each ingredient plays a special part that only it can do. “Flour provides the structure; baking powder and baking soda give the cake its airiness; eggs bind the ingredients; butter and oil tenderize; sugar sweetens; and milk or water provides moisture.”
Combining wet and dry ingredients activates these jobs, but Vodovotz says that it is crucial that dry ingredients are mixed in the right order, otherwise they have to compete for water and the recipe becomes clumpy.
You also have to make sure that you do not over mix the batter because as the ingredients combine, they create alignments between gluten proteins and strands and over mixing makes the batter runny. And once the mix hits the oven, the ingredients change yet again as the mix creates a stable structure to hold itself up.
While the cake cools, the sugars and fats play a crucial role in keeping the cake moist and preventing it from becoming stale.
Diné of Bake Love Not War found in her cake researching that three things must occur in order to make a successful and
delicious cake. In her words:
“1. The sugar must be equal to or less than the flour (in weight, that is).
2. The eggs and liquids (milk) must equal the flour.
3. The fat must equal the eggs.”
So she conducted her own experiment following these three steps and measured out the ingredients in grams to make sure everything was even. She played around with temperatures and consistencies and found these steps to be very true. In doing this, Diné was able to create those bakery style cupcakes we crave.
Who would have thought that so much research and preparation would have had to go into making a simple cupcake? It is quite amazing to think about these inanimate food stuffs coming together in such harmony and working as a power team. I guess this will teach us to appreciate them even more – if that is even possible.
Photo Link
Here is a ridiculously cool set of science themed cupcakes I found that happen to have my name on them.
^^ The photo failed to attach, so here is the link referred to above.
Katie, I have been contemplating writing a blog devoted to the science of cupcakes for a while now, as they are my all time favorite food. I searched the blog to see if anyone had beat me to it; in finding you and your self proclaimed baking skills, I would like to formally ask you to be my friend and official personal baker. In all seriousness, I own the Alex and Ani cupcake charm bracelet… some would call this obsession excessive; however, that is beside the point. Creating cupcakes involves combing different materials to illicit reactions and produce a product, in other words, a type science experiment. Here is a ridiculously cool set of science themed cupcakes I found that happen to have my name on them. On the website, “Baking is A Science”, I found an article on a technique called the reverse creaming method. This is also referred to as “the one bowl method” and produces the most “velvety” cupcakes. The first step is to mix the flour, sugar and oils together all in one bowl. “The oil coats the flour and prevents it from forming gluten.” When butter is whipped with sugar, it creates fluffy cupcakes resulting from the air pockets formed. The reverse creaming method avoids this, yielding denser cupcakes. Feel free to try it out and enjoy!
Wow this is very intriguing. Who would’ve thought so much would go into making a cupcake. I would never think that all the stuff you mentioned in the blog would have to happen to balance everything out to make a cupcake. Science really does play a big part in our everyday life and we just don’t really think about that. I guess this is why cupcakes taste so good. Good job with this blog.
This is so interesting. Who knew something so simple could have so much going on “behind the scenes”? I know Andrew pointed this article out during class today, and was so intrigued as to what it was actually about, so I just had to read it for myself. Great job!