Baking Trial 002 30 January 2013

Analysis of the sensory defects of Trial 001 proved most insightful. Feedback informed some alterations to the initial formula, and the results are much improved!

The Browne Crowe Bakes Sensory Evaluation Team took another bite of the now-24 hour old Trial 001 cakes, which were sealed in a locking food-storage container over the past day. Regrettably, and unlike fine wines, the NOT-winkie sans remplissage rev 001 has not improved with age, so the latest sampling compels the following to be added to the sensory-defect list:

• gummy
• heavy
• squishy 

The ingredient proportions have been modified as listed, and the batter make-up has been tweaked somewhat. While better, it still falls short and must be adjusted further to address some issues listed later:

Flour, cake     100 g
Flour, RS Rice   10 g
Baking Pdr.       5 g
Baking Soda       1 g
Sugar, gran.     85 g
Oil, canola      36 g
Salt, kosher    1.7 g
Eggs, whites     72 g (from 2 large eggs)
Eggs, yolks      36 g (from 2 large eggs)
Whey, sour       52 g (drained from skim milk yogurt)
Honey            52 g
Vanilla ext.     5 ml

Lemon extract    8 drops
Extract, Sunflower kernel +20 g (from 0.5M extraction)

Mise-en-place setup was modified chiffon-style:

1. Stir together in plastic cup whey, honey, soda, RS rice flour, vanilla, lemon. Stir and let sit for 1hr., stirring occasionally.
2. Sift together cake flour, baking powder, 40g. of the sugar, and salt.
3. Separate eggs, whites into meringue bowl with remaining 45g. sugar on the side; yolks into primary mixing bowl with sunflower extract; oil on the side.
4. Preheat oven to 320°F; place pan of boiling water in rack under main rack.
5. Baking pans ungreased.

Make-up as follows:

1. Whisk egg yolks & sunflower extract; do not expect classic ribbon consistency.
2. Gradually drizzle oil into yolks while whisking, forming a loose emulsion.
3. Drizzle liquid mixture into yolk-sunflower mix, whisk until uniform.
4. Reduce mixer speed and sift in flour mixture, beating until fully moistened and uniform.
5. With cleaned utensils, whip the egg whites until soft-peak is reached, then sift in sugar and whip until a medium-peak French meringue is formed.
6. Lighten flour-egg batter with ¼ the meringue, then fold this into the remaining meringue until uniform.

Egg yolks plus sunflower extract

Lightening the batter with meringue portion

The batter was portioned into the pan using a ¼-cup measure to fill the cups halfway. Each pan portion weighed about 34.4g. Excess batter was divided into five cups of a standard cupcake pan, unlined.

Filled pan cups

The Canoe shape was baked at 320°F, and first tested at 15min. The center four cakes were still undone, so baking continued to 18min., whereupon the toothpick test passed. Cupcake shapes were baked in a separate oven, 12½ min. at 325°F, without water pan.

Cakes at half-done point

Finished baking

The cakes were allowed to cool somewhat, contracting slightly and pulling away from the cup walls a bit.

Depanned cakes, looking very familiar...

Depanning was with an inverted, vigorous slap against a sturdy wooden surface. Due to no release coating having been applied to the pan cups, it took several slaps to depan all cakes.

Cake pan-skin stuck to the cup - quite a cleanup!

Cake average weight was about 27.3g, for a baking loss of  1-(27.3/34.4)=21%: still a little high, but not overbaked this time.

Trial 002 resulted in a moist, somewhat supple cake with the highly desired Twinkie-like external open-cell surface structure, in contrast to the greasy-floury puckered elephant-skin of Trial 001.

Sensory evaluation:

• Sweet, but not too too sweet or cloying; more dessert-like
• Slightly sticky (but so are Twinkies!)
• Squishy, but in a good way
• Puffy texture
• Taste is “way better”
• The note of lemon is a pleasant surprise
• Better sponge fineness and uniformity
• Cupcakes were overbaked with a slight egginess

It would seem that presoaking the RS rice flour eliminated the gritty after-sensation, and that neutralizing the acidic honey and whey with the soda is best done during the presoak, rather than adding the dry soda to the flour mixture.

Even though the egg yolks being whipped with the sunflower extract “ruined” the expected ribbon stage of yolk whipping, that last canonical step’s disappearance did not seem to make much difference to the end result, much less spoil the batter.

Adjustment for next trial:

• Research in-batter additions or ratio tweaks for aiding release from pan; chiffons must cling to pan for gas-sponge support and for resisting shrinkage while cooling, but release is a insufficient for production.
• Ensure that eggs are the freshest possible. One member of The Browne Crowe Bakes Sensory Evaluation Team is especially sensitive to egginess.
• Reduce cupcake baking temperature a bit, and add a hot-water pan to the second oven.

More trial results to follow...

Beekeeping for Poets

 “—” ‘—’’