What is the point of baking?

[waitingforautumn]

OK to cover myself - I'm actually not a bad baker (promise! :)) my issue is that baking - while highly therapeutic, is not necessarily cheap, and it leaves you with a commitment to eating the baked good all week!! (doesn't sound like a bad thing does it...). Cakes in particular are quite hard to scale down.

AIBU to just prefer a supermarket / cafe slice of cake etc to spare myself the faff and expense of baking, and the smaller/individual portion sizes?! I know they are rarely as good as the home baked kind but some of them can be very decent. I get FOMO for not baking when a lot of friends and family do it - they make it look so fun and rewarding! Yet when I bake I totally lose interest in the final product after I've had one portion.

I spent a large chunk of last weekend baking a half size chocolate cake (it could still feed 10 tbh!), and by the end I just wish I'd gone to M&S lol. Especially now, 4 days later, when the fam are all bored of it and the remainder of this cake is just sitting there uneaten, getting drier and drier every day... yet we all feel too guilty to throw it away. It wasn't a very nice recipe actually. Not chocolatey enough and was on the dry side to begin with. But thats just part of the risk of trying a new recipe I suppose.

Or am I just missing the point of baking???? Is it supposed to be something people only do when feeding a crowd? How often do you bake and why do you do it? Does it all get eaten?? If you crave something in particular are you more likely to bake it or go out and buy it?

If it's getting to the end of the week and the cake is getting dry it makes a good base for a trifle, that's what I do with it

I actually do scale back, for example I will bake just one or two cookies, four cupcakes so we have one each, smaller loaf cakes by using foil to cut down the pan. I do prefer home baking because we know what's going into it and in our house we have a plethora of food intolerances and allergies so it's worth it for peace of mind.

If you cook it yourself you know what is actually in it, and who has touched it. No, it's not cheaper, but yes like twoTinyCrafters, you can scale down most receipes. You can bake a lot of things perfectly well in a microwave, ie the mug sponge cake

If you don't enjoy baking then don't do it.
The advantages of baking is you can use higher quality ingredients than shop bought products would have in them. The products can be tailored to your personal taste.
I enjoy baking and find it a great de-stresser.
But everyone to their own

OP, I think one thing that proves you are not alone is the sheer size of the cakes and bakery sections in any supermarket!

Yes of course this thread attracts posts from lots of people who love home baking, don’t like shop-bought cakes and never buy them. But any trip to the supermarket will show there are a hell of a lot of people who are more than happy buying cakes.

I love home baking, and during lockdown I’ve also got the hang of making bread. Ok I’m retired! As there’s only two of us, cakes that can’t freeze ( ie apple cake, iced stuff) I share with my two neighbours who work and have little time. That way I can satisfy my cake guilt.

Yesterday I made orange and almond cake, Almond biscuits, Chocolate chip cookies, Bread pudding, Coconut cake, and two loaves of bread. It will all be gone by this evening.

my issue is that baking - while highly therapeutic, is not necessarily cheap, and it leaves you with a commitment to eating the baked good all week!! (doesn't sound like a bad thing does it...). Cakes in particular are quite hard to scale down

I don't care if its cheap or not, and eating the result is literally the point.

Maybe just stop making such massive cakes?

cab to bake most of the time, and don't want all the temptation hanging around... but shop bought cake is usually horrible and a waste of calories unless it comes from a proper bakery or farm shop or something

What's the point of baking?

Several points: it's fun! It's like magic - the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. And, finally, there is pleasure in sharing a homemade cake or loaf of bread with other people.

Where I lived before the local church had a Sunday evening drop-in session with coffee and cake for people who wanted a chat. I always enjoyed making cake or biscuits for visitors as it was my way of saying "someone cares about you".

Obviously the point of baking is if you enjoy the process and/or can make food that is nicer or cheaper than you can buy.

If you don't enjoy it and can't make nicer bread or cakes, that's perfectly fine! You don't have to like the same pastimes as anyone else.

I quite get this - and I like to bake but do it rarely. Usually it's because i've something that can be used up (overly ripe bananas or a glut of apples etc). I like the results but do end up normally taking half+ into work to get rid of it.

And then there's the expense! This is why it's cheaper to contribute to a bake sale by buying a box of donuts or a cake from Tescos. That will cost you a couple of ££ and the bake sale will still make loads.

I love to bake and my son asked me to get Claire Saffitz's dessert persons new book and as he staying at home from university ive been baking every weekend. Well It's a blooming nightmare like a chemistry lesson and everything is made so complicated and as it's American I'm trawling shops for ingredients. Think I will stick to tried and tested recipes!

anyone else's family is just not into cake? I really wouldnt mind getting into baking but neither DH nor DC are all that keen. They are much more into savoury things before anyone assumes we're all health freaks

sum1980
Same here.
As a family not into sweet stuff. Even when my kids were small chocolate Easter eggs would still lie unopened for months.
Not into super healthy stuff, crisps and twiglets, bombay mix will get gobbled up.
Just no one likes cakes or sweet things very much.
We still have loads of chocolate from Christmas. I will put it into a food bank, as I know it won't get eaten.

How about making a smaller simpler cake? Mary berry, Delia all in one sponge recipe, just needs flour, eggs, sugar, fat, jam. A cheap jam is easier to spread on your cake too.

American I'm trawling shops for ingredients.

Faffing around for the 'right' flour and having to adapt for the extra water they have in butter is a pest. Plus their eggs are tiny (their large is our medium) - I loathe US recipes. Does she use US volume or is she a convert to weighing scales like the excellent Stella Parks (Bravetart)?

@sum1980

anyone else's family is just not into cake? I really wouldnt mind getting into baking but neither DH nor DC are all that keen. They are much more into savoury things before anyone assumes we're all health freaks

Yes, as I said upthread, mine just don’t like cake, they only like a couple of brands/types of biscuit too. I just don’t recognise the ‘all kids love sweet stuff’ line. Mine don’t even like fruit. I remember buying a punnet of strawberries at a market and handing it to the dc to hold while I paid and there were lots of people laughing and saying ‘oh they’ll be gone before you turn round’ and ‘they won’t make it home’. While my kids looked at the fruit like it was poison. The boys will eat a whole pack of dry breadsticks each tho and dd would mug you for some broccoli. I’m the same, give me a stinky cheese board any day.

Even the best cake would be wasted here.

my dd isn't into cake because she can taste the egg - though she likes scrambled egg. dd will eat eggless cake or donuts, croissants etc but just not into cake.

It’s educational, it’s therapeutic, it’s affirming, it reaches the soul.

It doesn’t have to be for personal consumption or in usual times, needn’t be eaten alone.
Give your produce to others (cake sales, elderly neighbours, homeless shelter, village fete, post out to an army battalion or Royal Navy ship on deployment) and get the warm glow altruism brings.

Nothing beats warm scones fresh from the oven with homemade jam and clotted cream eaten in the garden with friends.

Is it altruistic if you get a warm glow?

imv homemade taste of butter, eggs, and look brown because the sugar browns in the oven. Bought doesn't taste much of butter or eggs - just sweetened or flavoured sponge, not always got actual sugar in them.

But people are accustomed to this so a cake is just a sweet thing.

I would say it's the difference between cheap sliced bread and a farmhouse wholemeal loaf. Both can be ok depending on what you are wanting.
I don't like glycerine icing which is the stuff used for b day cakes. No flavour just sweet. Iprefer cream or butter icing. Richer. Go better with the cake.
I can make a batch of 12 buns in 10 mins, +15 to cook.

I do bake often. I like the process. I've done it for over 30 years so I'd say I'm fairly skilled at it now. I rarely bake the goods for myself (unless I whip up a batch of cheese scones - I've made them so many times in my life I can have idea to plate in less than 30 minutes). My friends love nothing more than a wee treat box left on their doorstep. That is where I get my joy out of baking.

Early in 1st lockdown when flour was especially so hard to get, it was a good way to use up some out of date gluten free flour that had been sitting in the cupboard since a GF BiL’s visit over 2 years previously.

It made a perfectly nice Barm Brack - only 1 egg needed - they were scarce, too. Since you soak the fruit in cold tea it wasn’t remotely dry.

Other than that, on the odd occasion I feel like making a Victoria sponge, I take about half to some very elderly neighbours, to stop dh and me making 🐷🐷 of ourselves.
There’s nothing like a freshly home-made VS - no shop version even comes close.

Ooh good point about scones LemonRoses. Anyone who doesn’t get the point of baking, make homemade scones and then try them alongside shop bought scones. Then tell me you can’t see the point!

EmbarrassingAdmissions she does use gram but not easy recipes as you don't cream butter with the sugar so super complicated and too much sugar and definitely too much lime in one of her recipes!! Was trying to source cake flour to make her birthday cake but just gonna make BBCgoodfood Victoria sponge instead yay!!