I made a spaghetti cake for my father-in-laws birthday (it's posted in the gallery). I tried to doctor the cake mix by adding sour cream and a pudding mix, not to mention it was generic brand cake mix...big mistake. The cake sunk while cooking and I had to cook it 20 minutes longer then I normally do. So after trimming the "bowl look from the cake, which was a pain seeing as the cake didn't want to trim, I tried to carve the sides of the cake so they look more like a bowl. It was awful. Then the cake crumbled so bad when I was crumb coating I thought I would never get it to work.

At least the decorating worked...the only bad thing is that it settled and shifted so much there was a huge crack in it when we finally cut it.

That's the last time I try to doctor a generic cake mix.

I feel your pain! I did the same thing on Monday! The cake sank in the middle and I didn't have time to bake another one. I fixed it up the best I could, and once it was decorated you would never know - until you cut into it! Luckily it was for a friend....

It may not have been your generic mix. I have made a really good light pound cake using a doctored generic mix but it could have been the amount of fat you added to the mix. When you start doctoring you have to balance the amount of fat you are adding because it will cause sinking and other problems. Like when I add melted white chocolate to a cake mix I adjust down the oil and things like that. I also find that my doctored cakes do take longer than a regular cake mix and if you start checking it early it will sink. Also try checking your oven temp with an oven thermometer. Your temp may be a bit off and that will give you problems as well.

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