Hi,
I am sure this question has been asked before but I cannot find the topic thru search thats why decided to ask it again. I have to bake a large cake (13*13 square; large by my standard) I want to make sure it does not collapse from the middle as I understand large cakes tend to do so. Can you please let me know how to prevent this.

Thanks in advance!

i'm not sure what you mean. do you not want it to collapse while baking or after you take it out of the pan??

While baking...come to think of it,also after i take it out of the pan

for baking...use a heat core. if you don't have one, you can use a flower nail.
usually cake recipes that are sturdy are good to work with. i recommend the wasc recipe on this site. i just made this recipe and it is not only delicious, but sturdy.

you can find it by clicking on the recipe tab and typing in wasc...white almond sour creme.

collapsing in the middle is usually a sign the cake was not baked all the way.

Thanks..Yeah i am planning to use the amazing chocolate WASC recipe by cake pro.Btw, how do we use a cake nail?

When I do larger cakes, I use the bake even strip(s) around the pan and at least one flower nail. For a pan 12" or larger, I use between 2 and 3 flower nails. You use the metal flat-topped flower nails. Grease them as you do your pan. Then once pan and nails are greased, I lay my nails in the pan - upside down (flat side on the bottom of the pan and nail end sticking up) - and pour in the batter. The nails will shift around while pouring, but I just slide them (do not pull them out of the batter and stick back in - just SLIDE them through the batter) back to where I want them = evenly spaced near the middle of the pan. Bake cake. After cooling in the pan for 10 minutes, flip the cake onto a cooling rack and pull out the flower nails. There will be a small hole for each nail, but nothing a little buttercream won't hide.

WOW! Thanks Tracy1970...That was very well explained!

No problem! Good luck. I've had much success doing this.

I add a tsp of baking pwd to each cake mix in the choc and WASC recipes. Bake strips and flower nails work great!

I just baked three sheet cakes this last week and didn't have any problems using the WASC recipe. I bake my cakes at 300 degrees F which I've found raises nicely and didn't sink any. They do take a little longer but worth the extra few minutes of waiting