How to Bake More Like A Professional

Simple tips that can make a huge difference between baking like an amateur and looking like a professional overnight.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• Patience
• Recipes
• Proper pots and pans
• High quality ingredients
• Good math and chemistry skills or the ability to pick up these skills.

1. rolling pastry Practice, practice, practice. Alot of baking techniques are not things that can be picked up immediately, have patience with yourself.
2. cookies Learn to organize. The best way to avoid forgeting ingredients or steps is to learn about mise en place, or everything in its place. This means collecting all ingredients, tools, pans and your recipe before you start so you are not running around later. This can reduce preparation time also(ex. melt the butter before you need it, whip the egg whites before you get to the step).
3. chocolate curls Use the correct tools, pots and pans for the job. This can simplify steps and make learning easier. For example, if you need to slice something you need to have the correct tool(in this case a knife) because a fork will make a jagged edge. Also, the proper tool can create the same uniform look for each dessert, that is a true sign of a professional.
4. pie Use the best ingredients to create the best desserts. Another industry motto is garbage in, garbage out. This means if you use the best flour, fresh strawberries and genuine vanilla extract you are going to get a different flavor than using poorly treated flour, frozen strawberries and imitation vanilla extract. This is something that all self-respecting chefs live by.
5. cake The MOST IMPORTANT lesson is to do your math correctly and measure carefully. Every recipe is a formula, if you change that formula you will end up with a different result. For example, with one recipe you can make pancakes. Change a few ingredients and you will end up with crepes. Change a few more ingredients and steps and you make waffle batter. Take it from the construction workers, measure twice and cut once...only in baking terms-measure twice and add to the bowl once.

Tips & Warnings

• Always have patience with yourself.
• Pick a great recipe and make it over and over again. Family, friends, neighbors and co-workers all will love the extra goodies while you practice the techniques.
• Don't rush yourself, you can hurt yourself easily with a hot oven and sharp objects.
• Learn about food safety and sanitation so you can keep your family and friends safe while you learn.