How to Bake a Simple Cake: Our Easy Chocolate Cake Recipe (that kids can bake!)
In the recipe below you’ll find the basic formula for how to bake a cake, vanilla or chocolate. This is the way I was taught to make chocolate cake as a child. It let us bake cakes without referring to a recipe from when we were about 4 years old. This can be used for a simple cake, or made into a shaped cake which is a birthday tradition for us! Below is an explanation and lesson to explain all the options then a very simple recipe at the end. The idea is you too won’t need a recipe to bake a simple cake with what you have!
The Basic Formula to Bake a Simple Cake
- The basic cake formula is a 1:1:1:1 ratio of sugar, fat, eggs and self raising flour. Mixed together this will bake into a cake.
- As an egg weighs about 2oz, you need the same number of ounces of sugar, fat, and self raising flour, and half the number of eggs. That’s all you need to remember! Now you can have an easy to remember cake recipe that even kids can use. E.g. 4oz butter, 4oz sugar, 4oz self raising flour.. and 2 eggs. This is the example in the recipe below.
- You can then alter it, tweak ingredients, and change the flavours but that’s the basic idea and it works! We learned this as little kids and it’s still the recipe my whole family uses now.
Some Substitution Options
- The most usual substitution for us is: subbing out about 1/8-1/4 of the flour for cocoa to make a chocolate cake. So in a cake with 4oz flour, switch to 3oz flour and 1oz cocoa or 3.5oz flour and 0.5oz cocoa for amore mildly chocolatey cake.
- For a more “fudgey” cake: You can sub 1/3 of the flour for almond meal – this is especially good in a chocolate cake!
- In place of self raising flour: you can add a generous 1/2tsp baking powder for every 2oz of flour in this recipe. So a heaped 1tsp if you’re using 4oz of flour.
- For fully vegan or gluten free cake recipes: I have our go to options in The Whole Treat ebook HERE.
WHAT ABOUT CUP MEASUREMENTS?
Each ingredient has a different cup volume for its weight amount. This simple cake formula is more easily done with a scale – especially for kids. But you can look up the cup volume for each ingredient you’re using, on google. Google “2oz of coconut sugar (or other ingredient) in cups” to get the volume you need.
e.g. 4oz butter = 1/2 cup, 4oz granulated sugar/honey/maple = 1/2 cup, 4oz self raising flour = 1 cup. These are all approximate and rounded to the nearest 1/4 cup for easy measuring, but it will work!
Items I use for this recipe:
WHAT CAKE PAN SIZE?
You want the batter 3/4′-1″ thick uncooked in the pan so you can use any cake tin as long as you adjust the cooking time.
2oz of everything cake: I put this amount of batter in 2 ramekins for single serving mug cakes.
4oz of everything cake: will fill a 6-7″ cake pan or a 7-8″ for a thinner cake perfect for multiple layers.
16oz of everything cake: I would use for a 4 layer large cake in 7-8″ cake pan like the one in the picture below – it will feed 20+ people with a good sizes slice.
HOW MUCH COOKING TIME DOES IT NEED?
This will depend on the size of tin and your oven. The best thing is to know what to look for. You’re looking for the cake to be just firm to the touch, and for a skewer to come out clean if gently inserted in the centre. That usually means 10-15 minutes at 170C/340F for an individual mug cake and 15-20 minutes for 4oz cake in a 7-8″ pan, or 25 minutes for a 4oz cake in a 6″ pan. For anything larger than a 8″ round I’d check it after 25 minutes and add more time in 5-10 minute increments. Give it a touch and if it’s not springy yet, give it some more time.
The Basic Formula for a Simple Cake
Equipment
- cake tin
- parchment paper
Ingredients
- 4 (or any multiple of 2) oz butter Coconut oil or vegan butter can be used in the same amount
- 4 oz sugar this can be honey, maple, sucanat, coconut sugar or any sugar option. A coconut sugar will give a wonderful deep flavour to a vanilla cake.
- 2 eggs
- 4 oz flour This can be self raising brown or white flour, plain white or brown flour, oat flour or a gluten free 1:1 substitute flour. If you want a chocolate cake you can sub 1/4 of the flour measurement for cocoa. For a more fudgy chocolate cake sub up to another 1/4 for ground almonds. To keep it simple for kids to remember use self raising flour so there's no baking powder to remember.
- 1 1/3 tsp baking powder Omit if you are using self raising flour
- 1 tsp Vanilla extract (optional) If it's a vanilla cake, go on the higher end!
Instructions
- "Cream" together the butter and sugar ingredients – that means just mix with a fork until well combined. Depending on what you're using this will give different end results but just get it well mixed.
- Beat in the eggs one by one, mixing with a fork until well combined.
- Add the vanilla and mix it in.
- Add the remaining dry ingredients and fold them in with a spoon until evenly combined.
- Prep a 6" cake tin, with parchment paper on the bottom and sides and fill with batter. Smooth the top with the back of a spoon. (You can use a 7-8" pan and reduce the cooking time by 5 minutes.)
- Place in a 340F/170C oven for 20-25 minutes.
- Remove when the cake is just springy to the touch and a skewer inserted comes out clean.
- Turn the cake out onto a wire cooking rack and leave until fully cool before icing.
Notes
