Here are some more basic tips to make your creations even sweeter.

The tips are excerpts from the BAM book Cakes.

> Buy the e-book Cakes

Egg size is very important

The size of the eggs affects the ratio of the ingredients, i.e. the texture and taste. You have probably followed a recipe to the letter and the result was not what you expected. In this case, the size of the eggs is almost certainly to blame, as they were either too small or too large for the amount of (mainly) dry ingredients. So if the recipe calls for a certain egg size, take this into account.

Preparation of the sponge cake mixture

To make the basic sponge cake mixture, you only need three ingredients: eggs, sugar and flour. For biscuits, the proportion of sugar and flour is generally equal, but for rolls the proportion of flour is slightly lower, so the dough is elastic enough to prevent cracking when rolled.

As with all the ingredients (except where the recipe calls for otherwise), the eggs should be at room temperature, as this helps them to mix in better with the other ingredients and the dough to rise more. Baking powder is unnecessary in the case of the basic sponge cake, as the air is introduced into the mixture when the eggs are whisked, and the air bubbles play their part in the preheated oven. Whisk the eggs with the sugar for at least 10 minutes to obtain a thick, airy and fluffy mixture. Always mix the dry ingredients first, then sift them on top of the egg mixture, and fold them in by hand with a spatula, using a gentle, lifting motion - this will keep the mixture airy. The prepared sponge cake should never wait, so prepare the baking trays in advance and preheat the oven.

If the oven temperature is too high, the mass rises too quickly and the air evaporates too quickly, resulting in a crumbly sponge; if the temperature is too low, the sponge will be dry, just as if it had been baked for too long. A properly prepared and baked sponge cake is soft, light and moist.

Whipping sweet cream for creams

The sweet cream must be really well chilled before use. The biggest mistake when whipping cream is that most of the time it is whipped too hard. This makes it harder to incorporate evenly into the creams, it has a different texture and the end result is not what we expected or tasted elsewhere. So - with exactly the same ingredients, process and recipe - we can achieve a completely different texture of cream because of such small details.

In addition, over-whipped cream, if not during the whipping itself, tends to curdle while it is being mixed further when combined with the cream base. For custards and mousses, always whip the cream medium-firm, more lightly (except for decorating and when the recipe calls for otherwise), which would be when the cream starts to show slight whisk marks and small ''rosettes'' form. To make the cream fluffier, do not fold in the cream all at once, but gently fold it in with a spatula in two or three steps. In the first step, the cream/base is unified with the cream so that the two ingredients are well combined; thus, adding the rest of the cream in the next step maintains the fluffy and light texture.

Melting gelatine

Soaked and strained gelatine can be melted in several ways. However, it is important that the gelatine does not boil; if it is melted in cream, custard or other liquids, the latter must not be too warm either.

Another problem with adding gelatine to custards is that warm gelatine, which is in much smaller quantities than the custard, gels too quickly on contact with cold custard, and lumps of gelatine form in the custard. This is easily solved by heating a few spoonfuls of cream (if there is a lot of cream, it will warm up - heat a few spoonfuls more) and dissolving the gelatine in it. This is then added to the rest of the cream and mixed well, usually followed by a dollop of whipped cream.

Melting chocolate

The most reliable and most commonly used method of melting chocolate is over a water bath, but there are a few factors to consider if you want the chocolate to melt nicely:

• the container in which the chocolate is melted must not touch the water,
• the water must not be boiling or too hot,
• the water must not come into contact with the chocolate,
• stir the chocolate several times during the melting process to make it smooth and completely liquid

Assembling cakes

When assembling (as well as baking) cakes, I prefer to use adjustable rings that can be tightly pressed around the cake, and acetate foil is a must. This ensures that the cake can be easily separated from the ring and that the layers remain nice and smooth.

As some sponge cakes shrink slightly after baking, I adjust the ring before baking to a diameter of less than a centimetre more than the desired diameter: for a cake with a diameter of 18 cm, I adjust the ring for baking the sponge cake to a diameter of approximately 18,5-19 cm.

I use a saw with a string blade (wire) to cut the sponge cake. The height is adjustable and the layers are always the same. Most of the cakes in the recipes contain smaller fruit discs and biscuits. To ensure that the cream is really well spread and filled around the centre, spread it using a piping bag.