Cake mix is a kitchen staple for many Americans. It is easy to make your own homemade cake mixes that will taste much better!
After World War II, big flour companies began to develop cake mixes. Betty Crocker, Duncan Hines and Pillsbury all offered eggy 레터링케이크 and eggless versions. According to Dichter, home cooks wanted more than just a box with water.
Sugar
Sugar is a sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrate that is found in many fruits and vegetables. It can also be produced commercially and added to foods as a sweetener, preservative, texture modifier, fermentation substrate and flavoring and coloring agent. Sugars are classified as monosaccharides if they consist of one molecule of glucose linked to one molecule of fructose, or disaccharides if they consist of two molecules of glucose joined together.
If you read the fine print on a boxed cake mix, you may find ingredients that don’t sound familiar (or even edible) like polyglycerol esters of fatty acids or partially hydrogenated soybean oil. Making your own cake mix means you can avoid these questionable additives and enjoy a more homemade-tasting cake. Plus, you can store your mix in one of my favorite kitchen items: the Mason jar!
Fat
When you look at the back of a cake mix box, you might see some ingredients that are a bit stranger than you might be used to. These can include things like polyglycerol esters of fatty acids, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, and cellulose gum. These additives can help cake mixes maintain a long shelf life and keep cakes moist, but they don’t necessarily add flavor or texture that you can’t get from scratch. Replacing the vegetable or canola oil called for in a mix with browned butter is a simple way to upgrade your cake’s flavor and add a subtle toasty richness to the crumb.
Flour
Flour is a powdery substance created by grinding whole wheat or other grains. It has a low moisture content which makes it easy to store in dry, cool environments.
There are many types of flour, each with a specific purpose in baking. Professional bakers use a combination of hard and soft wheat flours to get the best texture, flavor and appearance for baked goods.
All-purpose flour, also known as white flour, is milled from a blend of hard wheats and is usually enriched. It has a medium balance of protein and starch, which allows it to function well in most recipes. All-purpose flour can be bleached or unbleached. Bleached all-purpose flour has been treated with chemicals to speed up the aging process, resulting in a whiter and finer grain.
Flavorings
If you read the fine print on a cake mix box, you’ll find some jargon-y ingredients that sound like additives or preservatives, but they are just what’s needed for this type of food to be shelf-stable. Swapping these out for more natural ones will not only boost the flavor of your cake, but also make it healthier.
Most boxed mixes call for water, but a bit of flavored liquid like buttermilk or strong brewed coffee can deepen the flavor of your cake. Brown butter is another great add-in that adds nutty, toasted notes to the batter.
You can also use jam as a filling for cakes, cupcakes or muffins. This is especially good with lemon or red velvet cakes. You can even put the cake in a jar and wrap it up with some pretty twine for a fun, homemade gift.