I recently watched a documentary on the history of the development of cake mixes in the U.S. A common set of questions to "Betty Crocker" was about problems with cakes baked from scratch. Aside from electricity (my great grandmother probably had to cream butter and sugar by hand) and the development of gas and electric ovens (as opposed to wood stoves), I think that three products have made helped yield consistent results with scratch made cakes and make the process almost as easy as using a mix: digital scales, stand mixers, and oven thermometers. Digital scales (and recipes) that weigh ingredients in grams allow a degree of precision and consistency that's not possible with measuring by volume, especially for flour. Regardless of the mixing techniques (e.g., creaming, reverse creaming, hot milk), using a stand mixer also can promote consistent results, especially if recipes include directions for a stand mixer. Finally, oven thermometers have been one of my best investments; I have learned that my oven runs about 20 degrees cooler than what it says. Being faithful to a recipe's instructions is still important, such as having ingredients at room temperature, adding eggs one at a time, and not overmixing, depending on what the recipe calls for. With these 3 tools, however, I can bake delicious cakes from scratch that don't rely on chemically bleached flour and other additives that are designed to make a cake mix more forgiving.

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