woohoo, i discovered a little trick today when baking a cake for mi esposo. Instead of wrapping a damp towel around my pan, I just used one of those disposable pans and put about an inch of hot water in it and then put it on the rack under my cake. Boy it turned out good. It didn't hump up or crack or other weird stuff that seems to happen to cakes once they go into the twilight zone we like to call our oven. I have done this on other cakes too and it seems to work all the time. woohoo!!! ( at first I thought it was a fluke thingy but whoda thunk) got the tip from watching em on the tube makin cheesecakes in a waterbath. I will post a pic of the cake when i get it done. Gonna airbrush a horse portrait on it or maybe do my "colorado cake" which would you all rather see?

Colorado cake!

(Thanks for the tip too!)

great tip.

and (dating myself).....Trigger or Flicka!

thanks for the tip I hate when my cakes have a hump
my husband loves it though, he eats the cake shavings

chaptlps didn't you post a picture in a thread a while back of the Colorado cake you decorated ? I don't see it in your photos....? Gosh, if it wasn't you who posted it, who did?

Hold on there Trigger, you need to see this cake first!

I vote for the "Colorado Cake"! Not sure what that is...but it sounds interesting...ha!

BTW - so funny what you've nicknamed your oven...lol. DH & I like to refer to ours as "The Inferno"....if I don't constantly open it and check the thermometer I have in there & adjust the setting as needed, then things will inevitably burst into flames...or at least come very, very close to it....lol Other times it's known as "Molasses"...because it occasionally will take almost an hour for it to preheat to the temp you set it at. Then you put the food in it and it cools down about 75 degrees....wha'??? Then it takes forever to get back up somewhere near the temp it needs to be at...aagggghhhh. Don't know how I've managed to cook things, especially bake, in it for this long.

Today was a "Molasses" day...lol. I made a cake for my FIL's bday - 2 8" rounds, lemon. Here's my best description of what it looked like when I turned it out onto the cooling rack: Remember those Kellogg's Corn Flakes or Special K cereal commercials where they had a simulated waistline/tummy and then a measuring tape wrapped around it and "shrank" it in the middle?? Well....that's what it looked like!! lol It's like it started to rise, changed it's mind, and then thought better of it and started rising again...lol. But it was done in the middle, thank goodness, and the texture & taste was super yummy. And since it was a quickie-cake for the bday family dinner thing tonight, I didn't bother torting and it didn't really matter what it looked like. I let my 5 yr old decorate it....his Grandpa loved it! I'll have to try the water bath next time...just might help me out. Thanks!

Great idea, chaptlps!
It looks easy and thank you for shearing with us.

Nitu

I know I've heard something about the damp towel trick but not sure exactly what that is. Does anyone mind sharing?

TIA

So these are basic towels because the one I heard used paper towels. I'd like to try it and see.

i did kind of a combo of the two. with the horse on top and the colorado cake thingee on the sides. here's the top of the cake first and then i will post the sides no borders or anything on this one (ran out of frosting sheesh) but ntl still looks ok (at least i think so) tried the "whipped cream buttercream" recipe on it and it acts a lot like "bettercream". hard to get it lookin perfect but passable. darn the file is just to darn big o well i will put it in my pics there. sheesh.

p.s. i painted the cake with my new little toy that dh (you guys are wearin off on me) bought me for christmas. Yes it's the little kopyjet but i like it cause i can get little bitty lines with it.
Sorry the top isn't the colorado cake part, but hey, i LOVE horses!!!!!

For as long as I can remember, my mother has always used this method for her cakes and rolls.

Her reason for doing this was to keep the cakes and rolls from burning.

k guys you asked for it. Tomorrow i will do a colorado cake at work and take some pics of it and post it for ya. It will be on a quarter sheet but won't have to worry bout runnin out of frosting at least lol. Plus i did a coupla other cakes at work that i need to nab the pics of (sorry, hijacked my own topic sheesh) they are of fbct that i did at work and the first one is huge omg it's on a full sheet cake. I was surprised that it didn't break on me it was bout the size of a half sheet cake.

good, can't wait to see another one! It was you who posted one ealier this year wasn't it?

nah haven't posted one of my colorado cakes as of yet. but will asap. (i hope) didn't have time today (monday) had all kinds of manager stuff to do. But i did get my two fbct's posted. hope they are up to snuff.
I also have a question though, Has anyone ever heard of the IDDBA? (International Dairy, Deli, Bakery Assoc.)

You know, I think the cakes ya'll are thinking about are "talmas" wonderful "frosting painted" cakes. She does such wonderful impressionistic style work.

nah i just put the pan of water on the lower rack "under" the rack the cake was on.

I was just searching for talmas, on this site and located her, but there were no pictures in her photos that showed the Colorado cake anywhere...
I have seen it before and for the life of me can't remember where now.

Oh, I tried the pan of water trick and I didn't think it worked all that well for me. I may have done something wrong too....