Follow these few secret tips and tricks and you’ll stop your cupcake cases peeling in no time.
We all know the pain of baking the perfect batch of beautiful, flat, flawless cupcakes only to come back from your cup of tea to find them all peeling away from their cases!
What went wrong? Was it the cupcake liners? The recipe? Was Mercury in retrograde because that’s the only reason you can think of!
Well it’s not you, or your recipe, and Mercury is just fine. You just need to know these few secret tips and tricks and you’ll stop your cupcake cases peeling in no time.
Firstly, make sure you are using good quality cupcake cases. We love the Confeta range for their bright colours and the perfect thickness of the paper.
Watch your fat content in your recipes. Higher fat recipes can make the cases greasy and they will struggle to stick to the cupcakes. Make sure you cream the butter and sugar really well before adding the other ingredients as this can also help reduce ‘greasiness’.
Make sure you buy the right sized cases to fit your pan. If the cases are bigger than the pan they will scrunch and wrinkle a bit and come away from your cupcakes. Luckily, we sell over 10 different sizes of cupcake cases.
Make sure your batter gets into every nook and cranny of the cupcake cases, right into the little spiky bits!
Make sure you fill your cases 3/4 full: too low and your cupcakes will have a higher chance of peeling.
Make sure you have no air bubbles in the batter as this creates pockets of steam, and moisture is your number one enemy when it comes to peeling! Some people like to pipe their batter in, others find it easier to use an ice cream scoop. Just make sure you give it a little swirl with a toothpick or skewer before baking to release any air bubbles.
Bake low and slow, ideally around 160C. Test the temperature in your oven using an oven thermometer, as some ovens run hotter, some cooler. Turning the tray halfway through baking will help your cupcakes bake evenly across the batch.
Cook for slightly longer than you think you need to, they should be slightly brown on top. Don’t assume a whole tray is done when one or two cupcakes are, they will all bake at slightly different rates. Cook chocolate ones a minute or two longer than you think they need as it’s harder to see the browning on chocolate cupcakes!
Don’t cool your cupcakes in the tray, this creates moisture which is not your friend! Remove them after about one minute and cool them on a wire rack, giving each cupcake a little space to breathe.
Try to store your cupcakes in a cardboard cupcake box rather than an airtight container as these can cause sweating. We have a wide range of cupcake boxes to suit mini and regular cupcake sizes.
Baking perfect, flat cupcakes with cases that always stick can take some practice, but follow these tips and tricks and you should be churning out batch after batch of perfect cupcakes. To learn how to decorate them as beautifully as you bake them, check out our Classes Page for any upcoming cupcake decorating classes!