Butter or Margarine for a less dense yellow cake

Well, for other than cookies, margarine is usually not the best choice of fats if you are using regular margarine. Editing to clarify, I didn't mean margarine is the best choice for making cookies, it is just that if there is a choice between using butter or margarine in a cookie recipe, substituting margarine works well in cookies although there will be a difference in the taste quality. It does however bake up well in cookies.
There is a Baker's margarine specially formulized for commercial baking.
Have you tried the recipe on the Baking911 site? Our own BLittle has variations for her recipes there too. A lot of people have had great success with that recipe.
Hugs Squirrelly

Since "margarine" is a generic term, and you never know exactly WHAT is in each version of margarine, it's a crap shoot as to how your recipe would be affected. You might try Crisco instead of butter - or maybe a 50/50 blend.

margarine will certainly make the cake lighter and fluffier... I often swap between butter and margarine depending on what type of cake I need

dky, your margarines may be different in Australia too. Margarine should produce a less dense cake because it is made of vegetable oil and butter, well when the cake cools, the milk solids in the butter harden or set so you should techincally get a more dense cake with butter. But you won't get the taste from the margarine. Also many margarines have high moisture contents so you really need to use block or hard margarine unless using a commercial recipe adapted for Baker's margarine. Generally margarine though popular during the world wars when butter was next to impossible to buy, is not the fat of choice in cake baking and shouldn't be used as a substitute unless specifically called for.
If you don't like the density butter will create in a white or yellow cake, you are better off using a recipe calling for shortening or oil which actually makes the least dense cake.
Hugs Squirrelly

All my recipes are from Puerto Rico and on them it calls for either margariine or butter. I use margarine since it is less expensive. But haven't tried it with butter to see how different they are with either one.

Delete, duplicated post by accident.

I was always the assumption that the best way to make a cake less dense is to do it by cutting back on the eggs yolks. The use of egg whites will help lighten up the cake. A method used a lot is to incorporate beaten egg whites at the end for a fluffier feel to a cake.

Hope this helps some!

Sus

Squirrelly
Yes margarine is different here. I swap butter for margarine all the time, works a treat. Depending on how light i want the cake to be i will change the amount of rising powder i use and butter for margarine. Our margarines don't contain butter, they are *usually* vegetable oils, plus other additives, but not butter.
Cheers
Nati

Yes you must be right about the Australia thing.

Margarine here is in most peoples fridge rather than butter. Of course there are exceptions to that.

Also most of our recipes that are australian based will say butter or margarine... sometimes they call for a specific one but most times it says either.

I guess our margarine is made differently and therefore can be substituted easily.

So to clarify... if you are in Australia and you want a lighter and fluffier cake then use margarine, if you are in another part of the world.... follow the advice of your resident experts....

Thanks for clearing that up... I would hate for someone to be dissappointed with the results of substituting.

k

nati... we must have been typing at the same time as your post was not there when I started typing.

You said what I wanted to say... but couldn't put it into the right words.

Thanks


oh and I LOVE your new font for you business name on your site... just saw it today...

It is interesting because at one time, around war time and in the 1950's and 1960's, many recipes in North American cookbooks called for either/or due to lack of availability or costs. But the switch back to baking with butter occured in the 1970's. Butter, mainly for taste. Margarine will produce a different crumb. In white cakes shortening is considered to make the best crumb, with liquid shortening/vegetable oil considered to make the best crumb in a white cake. Of course the rest of the ingredients are based on the fat used so substituting fats alters the results.
Some people use half butter and half margarine or half butter and half shortening too. And now with mixes, we are seeing a change in how they are being formulated so that some will work better with butter, again the switch to butter for taste more than anything else.
It is interesting to see the differences in density and crumb according to the ingredients used. It is true that in a recipe calling for egg whites that are beaten separately and used as a main leavener, you get a lighter cake but once butter is added as the fat, the cake produced will still be heavier than a cake using shortening or oil or even margarine as the fat.
Even butters are different from country to country, some have higher fat
contents. It would be really fun to be able to try out the various country's fats to see the difference. Of course then you would also have to use the different flours these countries produce because the gluten content and types of wheats are also slightly different! So are the eggs.
Interesting subject and responses!
Hugs Squirrelly