Hoping someone has a great scratch recipe that can be used a base recipe and be made into different flavors with some minor additions. I am not having any luck finding one. I want it to be able to use it for stacked and carved cakes. I normaly use doctored box mixes. But would like to have one recipe that can be altered for whatever flavor I need. Thank you.

I can't see that happening in scratch baking. Almost all ingredients affect the others.

Chocolate can sink without the right leaveners, sugar, and fat.

Pumpkin needs quite a bit of adjustment due to the liquid in the pumpkin.

Some flavors work better with buttermilk, some with butter, etc. Red Velvet needs buttermilk.

Pound cake has no leaveners.

Angel food cakes are completely different from other cakes.

These are just the basics. You can possibly use one recipe, but none of those recipes would be the best that you could do because of the restrictions.

I probably have a hundred different recipes I use for cakes in my bakery, maybe more. Every flavor has a recipe that maximizes the taste to the best of my ability. I also use probably the same amount of styles of buttercream and fillings. This is one of the things that sets scratch baking apart.

I understand your idea of time-saving, but after awhile, I pretty much know most of my recipes by heart. It does get easier.

To make scratch baking go more quickly and accurately, I practice what the pros do, mise en place. Get everything out, measure, chop, sift, etc., everything before starting the actual recipe. It saves quite a few minutes plus it keeps you from adding something twice or leaving something out.

Have you tried Master Mix?
http://cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopic-49589-previous.html&sid=164cfc3acfc91c4aa65f187ec7124795

http://cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=654467&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=scratch&start=30
Just got done reading this thread. I think something like this was what I was looking for. Now I just have to spend the weekend trying all of them out. LOL. Im going to look at the master mix one as well. Thank you