my fairy cakes are all wrong.

[pipsqueakz]

I have tried all sorts of recipes and my cakes always spread go flat are dense or very fluffy but flat help!? Please.

Your oven?

Are you just putting cake cases onto a baking sheet? You need to put cake cases inside a muffin tray to allow them to expand in the correct direction. If you're already doing this I don't know why it's going wrong!

Please don't tell me its the oven its only two years old :( am using muffin tin maybe o should give up :(

Are all the ingredients you are using fresh?

Is everything you're using to make the cakes gleaming clean? No chance that bowls have a bit of butter left over in them, for example?

Do you have an oven thermometer to check that your oven is at the correct temperature?

Do the cake cases sit snugly in the muffin tin?

Leave the cases in the tin for about 3 minutes or so to cool before turning out.

What flour/ recipe are you using?

Everything is spotless clean I suffer a bit of ocd

All ingredients fresh.
Thermostat on oven works. I'm stumped. Maybe I under mix or over mix maybe my technique is all wrong. Sounds silly that a 29yr old can't make simple cakes :( lol. My kids are my guinea pigs and say they taste nice and call them pancakes lol. I've tried so many techniques thou I'm stuck oil. When kids go to nanny's cakes come out lush. I've even tried her method but no luck :( I'm cake dyslexic :/

What is your recipe?
I use 4,4,4 and two eggs. SR flour with a bit of baking powder thrown in for luck. 15-20 mins at 160.
Don't use supermarket own brand flour.

I've tried plain with baking powder and self raising flour in seperate recipes.

Oh why not supermarket own brand YD?

Use the Mcdougalls supreme sponge self raising, makes every thing taste gorgeous.

Thermostat on oven might work, but do you know for sure that it's accurate? I bought a thermometer after reading advice to do so from lots of recipe books and mine (brand new oven) was reading 30 degrees lower than the therm. I bought.

Can you talk us through your method? Maybe then we can work out what's going wrong, if it isn't the ingredients or the oven.

I love a bit of cake detectiveness.

My DH bought ASDA SR flour recently - all my cakes have been crap with it. Not had good results with Sainsbos either.
May be a generalisation, and may be coincidence but the OP is desperate!

The oven is only two years old have been through three ovens (not due to my cooking Lol) my roasts are lush though! OK so my method and ingredients last nights attempt is: 6,6,6 3 eggs. 1tbsp baking powder, 1tsp vanilla extract, 2tbsp milk. 180 25-30min.

4 eggs, 200g of everything else. Sr flour and a pinch of baking powder.

Use a mixer to cream the fat (I use stork) and caster sugar until its really pale and fluffy.

Add one egg and a spoonful of flour into the mix and mix slowly.

Do the same until all eggs and flour added.

Spoon into cases and cook at 150º for about 15 ( in my fan oven)

Never fails for me.

Sounds to me like your not getting your oven hot enough.

X post.

Temp looks ok.

I dont add milk to mine.

Is your baking powder in date?

Baking powder in date bought new one this week.

Ingredients look OK, maybe a bit high with the baking powder, but not excessive.

Now, what's your method? Do you cream butter and sugar first, or do the all-in-one method?

How long do you beat the ingredients for?

All in one method until smooth.

I use 230g of everything and 4 eggs, use stork marge (nothing else is as good in a basic sponge mix), make sure you mix the sugar and marge until its white and creamy, don't over mix once the eggs are in (or your cakes wont rise as much), make sure oven is hot (150-160). Works every time for me what ever flour I use .

Okay. Might be worth creaming your butter and sugar first, then adding other ingredients as Mike has described.

I'm still of the mind that your oven temp isn't high enough though, if they're coming out that flat.

Have you tried cranking up 20 degrees?

What you're saying should work, so I'm wondering if you're using cupcake cases in a fairy cake tin? A cupcake tin is much deeper. A fairy cake tin is more like a yorkshire pudding tray

I'm using the shallow 12 cake tin. I'm noting all your methods here.