Why does my cake always flop?

Cakes flop because you have fiddled with one or all of the processes I’ve mentioned above. A cake is a delicate thing that is made by scientific and not-so-sexy means. Perhaps you remember (if you’re not like me and didn’t flunk the subject at school) vaguely how science is about a whole lot of small, rather insignificant things coming together to become one rather very significant thing that does a whole lot of things you didn’t think it could do. Baking is more or less the same. If you take one of the components out or fiddle too much with it, your final product will not be what you thought it’d be.