I had intended to bake a fondant covered cake shaped like a japanese taiko drum. I baked the ends in a large pyrex bowl. When it came time to stack, I discovered that the pyrex bowl layers of cake were completely undercooked. The strange thing is that it's very solid and not soupy. The toothpick came out clean. Anyway, I'm disappointed that I've baked these cakes and can't serve it to people because it tastes too gummy. On the bright side, I can still carve it into the shape I want.

Anyone in the San Francisco Bay Area that can quickly whip up some tiered cakes for me?

is this cake to be eaten or just for show? If its to be eaten then you cant use this cake. In stead of baking in pyrex bowls or even the wonder mold pan i prefer to bake round layers and carve from there. At least this way i know the cake is baked in the middle.

sometimes in the pyrex bowls you have to do the baking at a lower temperature and for a longer period of time to get them fully baked.

Thanks for all of your comments. While baking in the pyrex bowl, I did turn down the oven to 325 and yet it still hadn't finished cooking in 4 hours. I know my oven temp is correct too because I have an oven thermometer in there. In any case, I took your advice and baked 6 10 inch rounds and did a tiny bit of carving. It actually turned out a lot better than the pyrex bowl would have. I was hesitant to carve at the beginning because 1) I have never done it before and 2) I tend to be artistically challenged most of the time.

The cake turned out even better than I had expected. I've tried to post a picture of it but I'm not sure if I'm doing this correctly.