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Terms Use in Baking
Terms Use in Baking
BAKING TERMS
Bake
To cook in an oven with dry heat. The oven
should always be heated for 10 to 15 minutes
before baking.
Batter
A mixture of flour, liquid, and other ingredients
that is thin enough to pour.
Beat
To thoroughly combine ingredients and
incorporate air with a rapid, circular motion.
This may be done with a wooden spoon, wire
whisk, rotary eggbeater, electric mixer, or food
processor.
Blanch
To partially cook food by plunging it into
boiling water for a brief period, then into cold
water to stop the cooking process.
Boil
To heat a liquid until bubbles rise continually to
the surface and break.
Caramelize
To heat sugar until it is melted and brown.
Caramelizing sugar gives it a distinctive flavor.
Chop
To cut into small pieces using a sharp knife,
appliance, or scissors.
Coats spoon
When a thin, even film covers a metal spoon
after it has been dipped into a cooked mixture
and allowed to drain.
Combine
To stir together two or more ingredients until
mixed.
Cool
To come to room temperature.
Cream
To beat one or more ingredients, usually
margarine or butter, sugar, and/or eggs, until the
mixture is smooth and fluffy.
Crimp
To seal the edges of two layers of dough with
the tines of a fork or your fingertips.
Cut in
To distribute solid fat throughout the dry
ingredients using a pastry blender, fork, or two
knives in a scissors motion.
Dash
Partially set
To refrigerate a gelatin mixture until it thickens
to the consistency of unbeaten egg whites.
Peel
To remove the skin of a fruit or vegetable by
hand or with a knife or peeler. This also refers to
the skin or outer covering of a fruit or vegetable.
Proof
To allow yeast dough to rise before baking. Or
to dissolve yeast in a warm liquid and set it in a
warm place for 5 to 10 minutes until it expands
and becomes bubbly.
Refrigerate
To chill in the refrigerator until a mixture is cool
or until dough is firm.
Rind
The skin or outer coating of such foods as citrus
fruit or cheese.
Rolling boil
To cook a mixture until the surface billows
rather than bubbles.
Rounded teaspoon
When dough is slightly mounded, not level.
Scald
To heat a mixture or liquid to just below the
boiling point.
Score
To cut slits in food with a knife, cutting partway
through the outer surface.
Softened
Margarine, butter, ice cream, or cream cheese
that is in a state soft enough for easy blending,
but not melted.
Shred
To cut food into narrow strips using a sharp
knife, grater, or food processor fitted with a
shredding disk.
Soft peaks
Egg whites or whipping cream beaten to the
stage where the mixture forms soft, rounded
peaks when the beaters are removed.
Steam
To cook food on a rack or in a wire basket over
boiling water.
Stiff peaks
Egg whites beaten to the stage where the
mixture will hold stiff, pointed peaks when the
beaters are removed.
Stir
High-Altitude
Baking
Baking
in
environments at higher elevations require
adjustments in ingredients and temperatures to
produce the same results as baking that occurs in
lower altitudes. When cooking is done at an
elevation greater than 3,000 feet, amounts of
liquids, leaving agents, and sugar, as well as
oven temperature may need to be changed.
Honey Produced from flower nectar through
the work of bees, honey is an all-natural
sweetener that produces a golden-colored curst
and holds moisture in different baked goods. Its
color and flavor will vary according to the nectar
that the bees use.
Ice Cream Salt The coarse solar or rock salt
used to help freeze ice cream should never be
used in baking as it is not food grade. See also
salt.
Instant-Read Thermometer This is a
stainless-steel probe thermometer that will
register a temperature almost immediately when
it is inserted into a mixture, dough, liquid or
meat. Bakers typically use it in the baking of
yeast breads.
Insulated Bakeware Insulated bakeware is
metal bakeware that is made up of two layers of
metal with layer of air in between. Typically,
insulated bakeware results in more consistent
baking results than when it is done with its noninsulated counterpart. The bottom crust also
tends to have less browning. When insulated
bakeware is used, longer bake times may be
needed for most baked goods, though the
temperature will not need to be adjusted. Cakes
and brownies made in such insulated pans,
however, will require a temperature 25 degrees
higher than that which the recipe lists.
Invert Sugar Used in fondant icings for
cakes, invert sugar is sugar syrup that has been