Hello

[Mythdefied]

Failed baker, saying hello and eager for advice.

Point me to a stocked kitchen and I can cook near anything. I'm a wiz on the stove top (gas; keep that electric stuff away from me). But in all my years - all Life, the Universe, and Everything of them - I've never once successfully baked a single thing, even with help.

My latest failure was banana bread, yesterday. What a disaster. I decided that with the internet, there has to be help for me out here now.

 

[Becky]

Welcome to the forum!

You sound like my brother, he's an excellent cook but doesn't do so well with baking. I think what a lot of good cooks don't understand about baking is that it's a science as well as an art; whilst with other things you can improvise and change the recipe along the way, with baking every ingredient serves a purpose and changing it will have consequences beyond just flavour.

I'd say to begin, make sure you find good recipes and follow them to the letter. Once you get a feel for the ingredients and what the texture should feel like then you can begin to experiment. If you're in the USA then I'd also strongly recommend getting some weighing scales and measuring your ingredients by weight rather than by volume. It really makes a difference for things like flour - the same weight of flour can give different volumes depending on how densely packed it is, and a different proportion of flour will change the outcome of the recipe. That being said, if you'd rather stick to volume then there are things you can do to ensure consistency (eg you can measure flour using the dip and level method).