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Baking the Cake Layers
Appears in
Published 2009
Large cake pans, such as the 12-inch round ones and the 18-inch sheet cakes, benefit particularly from being encircled or wrapped with cake strips (see Cake Strips) before baking in order to slow down the baking at the edges. Because the edges are so far from the center of the pan, what happens is that by the time the center sets, it is higher than the sides and the outside edges are overbaked. The strips will keep the layers flatter on top and more moist near the outer edges.
Since cake pans require space between them and the sides of the oven walls for air circulation, you can either mix the batter for each one separately, in which case you can reduce the baking time slightly, or you can fill the cake pans immediately after mixing and refrigerate one while the other is baking. In this case, you will need to bake the refrigerated layer a bit longer (about 10 minutes, depending on the size of the pan).