Top 10 Baking Tips To Start 2021 & Bake Like A Pro

Welcome to the new year and my ten best baking tips to start your year off right! If you’re learning how to bake at home, improve your skills, bake treats from scratch for your family, or finally start your cake business, you’re in the right place. Here are the 10 most important things you need to know to bake your best.

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Well hello, 2021!

With large weddings on pause in 2020, I had the space to focus on my baking recipe blog and baking business education courses that I have been dreaming about for years. Yes, years! Baking is my love language and while, I love, love, love making gorgeous wedding cakes dripping in sugar flowers, I also love the business side of cake…

AND AND AND just tooling away on homemade baked good and recipes for my family.
My C’Mon In The Kitchen blog full of Southern baking secrets and recipes finally came to life. You have been so supportive and receptive that I am not stopping now! Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Truly.

I am ecstatic for the baking journey that is 2021. There is much to cover, from Southern classic recipes to how to bake like a professional baking advice and everything in between. I get a little over-excited, so I have organized my baking recipe blog into different series that I’ll unveil over the next year.

See What Is Coming In 2021

Cake Of The Month

If you want to learn how to bake the perfect cake, in my cake-of-the-month baking series, you’ll learn all about the cake. Each month, I am going in-depth on a cake recipe, cake construction and cake decor.

When we’re all done, you’ll be able to bake from scratch a perfectly delicious and stylish cake, like this Chantilly cake recipe, just like a pro.

DIY Two-Tier Wedding Cake

Intimate weddings, small weddings, elopements and weddings at home. Smaller wedding celebrations are on trend in 2021 and many of you want to to know how to bake and create as simply stunning and delicious cake to celebrate your new union.

In this baking series, you’ll learn exactly how to design, bake and decorate your own wedding cake. From small weddings to engagement parties to bridal showers, this the DIY two-tier wedding cake series for you!

Biscuit Week

Sure, I love cake, but I am a Southern born and bred lady who LOVES a great classic biscuit recipe. In this biscuit baking series, I’ll be sharing all the biscuit recipes you’ll ever need.

I have biscuits recipes that will make your family wild. Better make a double batch.

Southern Summer Specialties

Speaking of Southern, I am going to share my Southern baking classics for the summer. We’ll start with the proper way to make Sweet Tea and end with a perfect peach cobbler recipes, of course.

In this Southern summer baking series, I’ll share my tried-and-true Southern staple baking recipes. Get ready!

Sugar Flower Series

In my how to make perfect sugar flowers series, you’ll learn everything there is to know about what makes a sugar flower look like the real thing. Whether you are a baking enthusiast or professional baker or cake designer, I have created step-by-step instructions on how to make sugar flowers, and tips on creating sugar flowers that will have your clients and guests swooning.

Once you’ve learned how to make sugar flowers the right way, you’ll want to put your sugar flowers on more than just wedding cakes, that’s for sure!

Wedding Cake Masterclass – For Professionals & Budding Businesses

My wedding cake masterclasses will be where the rubber meets the road. Your wedding cakes may be gorgeous and taste incredible, but your bank account doesn’t reflect the love and hard work you pour into each wedding cake creation.

With my wedding cake masterclasses, we are going to fix that. And, while we’re at it, I am going to share my hard-earned tips for how to bake the perfect cake every single time.

Perfect Pies

In this baking series, you’ll learn all about baking the perfect pie at home. We start with mastering pie crusts recipes and move right through all your favorite fillings for fruit pies and sweet pies and cream pies…oh so many pies!!! There will be lots of pie taste-testing, of course.

Cookie Swap

We just wrapped up my first annual holiday cookie swap full of cookie baking secrets, how to ship your cookies for our virtual cookie swaps and, of course, my favorite cookie swap recipes. This year will be my second annual holiday cookie swap and I’m excited already.

In this cookie baking series, you’ll learn the in’s and out’s of baking the perfect cookies at home and from scratch for your friends and family. I already have my favorite cookie recipes set aside to share with you. No worries, you’ll learn another twist on my most requested recipe ever, Southern cheese straws recipes.

Holiday Desserts

We will wrap this wonderful year with a few of my go-to holiday dessert recipes to impress! In this baking series, you’ll learn all about how to bake the perfect holiday desserts from scratch. My classic Buche de Noel cake recipe is a show stopper, but I have a few more holiday classic baked goods up my sleeve, don’t you worry.

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Top Ten Baking Tips

Before I launch into our first cake recipe for the year (Hint, it’s a classic vanilla cake recipe that you’ll use over and over again.), I want to start you off on the right foot with my top ten baking tips.

These are my best baking secrets that us professional bakers know, because we’ve spent hours (and hours) in the kitchen testing and testing and testing. I learned these baking tips the hard way, but you don’t have to.

With my baking tips, you’ll avoid baking mistakes and mishaps. Most of all, you’ll make baking at home even more enjoyable than ever for yourself, your friends and your family!

Here we go with the 10 most important things you need to know to bake from scratch like a pro…

  1. Read, Read, Read. Read the recipe in its entirety at least once…before you begin.

  2. Bake With The Best. Use the best quality ingredients you can.  

  3. Mise en Place…or everything in its place. Have all your ingredients at hand before you begin measuring. Measuring the ingredients prior to mixing will result in fewer mistakes. Did I add the salt? Did I forget to add the salt? If you measured everything before mixing, you can look at your measured ingredients and know right away if you added the salt.

  4. Weigh Your Ingredients. Weighing your baking ingredients instead of measuring them will give you a consistent product. Weighing is so much more accurate. Kitchen scales are inexpensive and can be found at kitchen stores, discount stores, and of course, Amazon. (Here’s a link to buy my favorite kitchen scale.) This small investment will yield huge dividends.

  5. Accurate Oven. Use an oven thermometer to check the accuracy of your oven. The correct oven temperature is crucial to the success of your baked goods. You can find an oven thermometer in most home good stores, kitchen stores, and of course from Amazon. (Here’s a link to buy my favorite oven thermometer.) I have an oven thermometer in my oven at all times.

  6. Follow The Recipe Exactly. Use the ingredients the recipe calls for. Baking is chemistry and for optimal results, follow the recipe as written and use the ingredients called for. 

  7. Invest In Pans. If you plan on baking on a regular basis, invest in a set of good baking pans. My favorite is Magic Line.  They are heavy duty pans and bake evenly. I recommend buying an 8” round set of three to start.  If you find yourself baking a lot you can always add different sized pans. Fat Daddio pans are another quality baking pan. (Here’s a link to buy the best baking pans recommended by the pros.)

  8. Room Temp Is Best. Unless the recipe states otherwise, have all ingredients at room temperature before mixing. Depending on the temperature of your kitchen, it might take 30 minutes to an hour for the ingredients to come  to room temperature.


    PRO BAKING TIP: How to know if your butter is ready to bake with? Room temperature butter should hold its shape but be soft enough that you can make an indention with your finger. It will be somewhat cool. What you don’t want is squishy or too-soft butter that doesn’t hold its shape. I don’t recommend the microwave for softening the butter. Remove the butter from the fridge and get the rest of the ingredients measured and prepare the pans. By the time you are ready to mix, the butter should be good to go.

  9. Preheat The Oven. The first thing I do on baking day is to turn on the oven! If the recipe calls for baking at 350° that means the oven temperature should be at 350° BEFORE the batter is placed in the oven.

  10. Baking Times Are Suggestions. Start checking your cake about 5 minutes prior to the suggested bake time.

Those are my 10 best baking secrets that all of the professional bakers know. And now you know too!

If you ever have a baking question, please leave a comment on any recipes on the blog and I’ll be sure to answer. You can always find me and ask questions over on Instagram or Facebook where I share lots of my baking behind the scenes.

Everyone is always asking what is Minette baking, so now you can follow my hashtag #whatisminettebaking where I share all that is going on in my kitchen.

Join Minette Rushing & C’mon In The Kitchen

C’mon in the kitchen with Minette Rushing Custom Cakes! For more of my baking secrets and Southern dessert recipes, be sure to follow along on the blog while I share cookies recipes, my best cake recipes and delicious recipes for fillings and how to make frosting recipes and so much more!

You can also shop all of my baking essentials and tools, so you’re fully equipped to join me in the kitchen for all things sweet and Southern. If you’re looking for the recipes that built my business and other business tips, please check out my cake business shop where I’ll show you how to build the cake business of your dreams, just like I did.

C’mon in the kitchen with me! I am waiting on ya’ll.

XOXO

Minette

  1. I am so happy to reconnect with you. I always enjoy your posts. Admire you work, and in general happy to walk this walk with you. Thank you

  2. Darlene Pierce says:

    Thanks for all of the great info and links! Oven thermometer is on my radar! 😘😘

  3. Maria Seypura says:

    Thank you for your recipes and your help.

  4. Helen JZK says:

    Hi Minette, I discovered you some years ago and always enjoyed your tutorials. I always thought it was very generous of you to share your knowledge. Also I think your climate is similar (heat and humidity in summer) so wonder how you cope. Great to see you back. Cheers, Helen

  5. Minette says:

    Thank you!!!

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