Rotate. Even calibrated ovens have hot and cool spots, with temperatures falling within a 50-degree range. Cookies, pies, tarts, and all but the most delicate cakes should be rotated during baking to achieve even browning and baking. The halfway point or shortly thereafter is generally a good time to rotate.
In the test kitchen, we often recommend rotating cakes, pastries, and breads in the oven halfway through baking to promote even browning. (This is especially important because most ovens do not heat evenly.) But we don't generally recommended rotating delicate, airy cakes for fear that they will collapse.
Cool Before Flipping
When you remove your cake from the oven, don't flip it out of the pan right away! Instead, let the cake cool for ten minutes in the pan. Then, placing the wire rack over the base of the cake, invert the pan. Peek under the wire rack and see if the cake has dropped out.
According to Real Simple, rotating your pans is a good idea to make sure your cake bakes evenly. As Bon Appétit explains, by turning pans 180 degrees, heat will be better dispersed throughout the pan instead of being concentrated in one area.
The instruction means "At the halfway point, turn the pan round and then continue cooking". If the cooking time is 10 minutes, then after 5 minutes, you would open the oven, turn the pan round (presumably 180 degrees), close the oven door and then cook it for another 5 minutes.
Rotate. Even calibrated ovens have hot and cool spots, with temperatures falling within a 50-degree range. Cookies, pies, tarts, and all but the most delicate cakes should be rotated during baking to achieve even browning and baking. The halfway point or shortly thereafter is generally a good time to rotate.
Unfortunately once a cake has cooled it is not possible to re-bake it. The cake would have to heat all the way through again and the outside parts of the cake would become too dry. Also if the cake has sunk in the centre from being underbaked it will not rise again as the raising agents in the recipe will have expired.
Cooling cakes
Recipes will usually give instructions for cooling but as a general rule, most sponge cakes are best left for a few minutes and then turned onto a cooling rack to avoid soggy edges. Rich fruit cakes are better cooled in the tin.
Leave the cake out for at least twenty or thirty minutes at room temperature before you try to remove it from the pan. Touch the top of your cake to get an idea of when it's cool.
Let the cake cool, but not completely.
Before you flip the cake upside-down, let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes to let it finish setting up. However, don't let it cool completely or it won't come cleanly out of the pan.
Its rise is created by the egg whites and until it cools, its structure is not set. Allowing it to cool upside down ensures it doesn't collapse. Many angel food cake pans come with feet around the edges for this very purpose.
Should I store my cake in the fridge? If a cake has perishable filling or frosting, it will need to be stored, covered well, in the refrigerator. If it does not have perishable filling or frosting, then it's generally fine to keep, covered at room temperature, for several days.
If you are cooling a sponge or angel food cake, it is recommended that you cool the cake upside down. This can be done by turning the pan upside down and setting the tube part over the neck of a stable bottle. Turning it upside down for cooling helps prevent it from collapsing as it cools.
As it cools it becomes more structurally sound. After five to 10 minutes the fat is also still liquid and lubricates the cake out of the baking tin. After that, the fat begins to solidify and can actually hinder the cake from sliding out from the tin.
Do you flip a cake when it's hot? Most cakes are best unmolded from their pan while they are still warm, otherwise they tend to stick. To remove, run a sharp thin-bladed knife around the cake's edges. Place your cooling rack over the cake and invert the cake onto the rack before cooling completely.
Greasing the pan is a necessary step even when using a nonstick pan. Whether you're using a bundt pan, cake pan, cupcake pan, or cookie sheet, applying a thin layer of grease to the sides and bottom of the pan will help your baked goods release with ease.
Cooling cake layers on a cake rack, allows air to circulate and prevents the layers from being “wet” on the bottom. Turning a warm or hot cake out of a baking pan too quickly, will crack and fall apart.
As a rule of thumb, cakes and other baked goods should be left in their pans on a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes. If you try to remove a cake from its pan immediately after baking, it can stick or fall apart because it is so tender.
If, however, the cake has cooled down enough to be warm to the touch or you've sliced into it only to find a liquid center, replace the slice, place it back into the original cake pan, cover it with foil, and place in a low oven (about 300 degrees F or 150 degrees C) until it is baked through.
The most common reason why cakes sink in the middle is that they're underbaked. If a cake isn't fully baked through, the center doesn't have a chance to set and it will sink. This creates a doughy, dense texture in the center of your cake layer.
Why is my cake wet in the middle? When a cake is wet in the middle it is because the edges have cooked faster than the centre. This happens because of the way the cake cooks naturally in the tin – the sides of the cake tin heat up first.
A properly baked cake is sublime. It's tender, moist, and has a perfect crumb. An overbaked cake, on the other hand, can be dry and tough. And maybe worse, an underbaked cake is gummy and dense.