The most common reason for a sinking center is that the center is underbaked. Cakes bake and set from the outer edges inward, so it's important to test for doneness in the center. It also could be due to a few other reasons, like your baking powder isn't all it should be, or measurements were slightly off. It could be moisture levels were off, and if it was a humid day or you live in a rather humid environment- your flour and other dry ingredients might not have been as dry as you might think. In that case, you had extra moisture in the final product that wasn't baked off entirely. You can combat that a little by adding in a bit of extra flour to absorb the extra moisture. Or you can store the flour in the freezer, where it will not tend to absorb extra moisture. Check your oven temperature, using a different thermometer than the built in one. It may also be your oven temp is off, and is running hot or cool. You can adjust for slight variance, if you know how much it is. Or if you can, you can also have the oven repaired with a new thermostat regulator. You can still rescue a cake with a sunken center. Remove the underdone part, and fill the center with fruit or such. You can also crumble the cake with frosting to make your own cake pops, or combine it with a pudding to make a trifle. The entire cake isn't ruined, it's just the center that has troubles - so rescue what you can. It will still taste just fine.
4 Comments