Years ago, I was making scratch cakes but began using mixes due to time constraints. People raved about the taste and moistness. Recently, I've been trying to test out some scratch recipes and haven't been able to make one that I like. So, just find what works best for you and go with it. You might even change your mind, even 17 years later. 
Kakelady,
What do you do to make your strawberry cake? I tried this past weekend to use a white mix and then add strawberry jello and frozen strawberries (well drained) but it just seemed way too moist and with that "gummy" texture that everyone complains about on mix cakes?
What's your secret? Please share?
i also tried it to make an orange cake since that's my sister's fav and we can't find the orange mix anymore.
Kakelady,
What do you do to make your strawberry cake? I tried this past weekend to use a white mix and then add strawberry jello and frozen strawberries (well drained) but it just seemed way too moist and with that "gummy" texture that everyone complains about on mix cakes?
What's your secret? Please share?
i also tried it to make an orange cake since that's my sister's fav and we can't find the orange mix anymore.
I made a raspberry cake using the jello a few weeks ago and it had the gummy texture so it may be the jello. Perhaps you could use the strawberry mix or just add strawberry flavoring to the white mix next time.
Behtola--Yeah I bet it is. I started experimenting with different flavor puddings. I made a simple butterscotch cake for my DH.
I've done both kinds of cakes. I haven't found a decent scratch chocolate cake yet. I love a huge chocolate flavor. I prefer boxed with my own touches....so I guess it's semi-homemade. It's just easier than having to do all that measuring. And a blessing if you have limited counter space.
As far as the question boxed or scratch? I say it's a variation of a boxed cake or just simply it's homemade cuz it is homemade.....
My husbands aunt bought a haunted house cake from a bakery in St. Louis and sent us leftovers. It was decorated nicely but it tasted awful. It was so dry it was like eating a 4 inch thick cookie.
kakelady----do they sell strawberry pudding mix? I haven't looked. but maybe you could use that instead of jello. Don't think it will taste the same but it still may be good.
I bake from scratch, though still wandering on a regular chocolate cake recipe...
But, since I can't find a fine enough powdered sugar, I've turned to a commercial buttercream mix - though it requires powdered sugar & butter, so it's not completely a "just add water" concoction. It is just like an unfrozen soft ice cream.
However.....keep feeling guilty as heck over it. I'll probably end up going back to Martha Stewart's Swiss Meringue bc....I hate eggs....
Kimmypooh.. have you tried the Double Chocolate Layer Cake from Epicurious.com? It is an excellent scratch chocolate cake. Loaded with chocolate and very moist so long as you don't over cook it. It's an easy recipe to follow too since you mix up the wet ingredients and then mix up the dry and add it to the wet all at once and mix until combined.. no creaming the butter and sugar and all of that.
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/DOUBLE-CHOCOLATE-LAYER-CAKE-101275
I have made it with sharffenberger chocolate and cocoa powder and with ghirardelli chocolate and cocoa powder and it is great eaither way. I even used hershey's special dark cocoa once because it's all I could find.. it was good with that too.
jkalman---thanks that looks great, I'm so gonna have to try it.
It sounds like you are beginning, as are alot of us here who have been bitten by the cake bug, box mixes are great to start with (and do you ever notice that some things taste sooo much better when someone else does the work of cooking). I love box cakes, but I haven't been around scratch too much, to be fair. It isn't cheating to use boxed cake mixes, but try the doctored recipes, they're fun and there is one in the recipe forum that is chocolate and is to DIE FOR!!! (Oddly enough, can't remember the name of it ) Good luck!
I make a killer starwberry cake from a mix, its one of my most requested cake flavors.
1 box DH Strawberry Supreme Cake mix
1 cup strawberry yogurt (I use the HEB brand, it has huge chunks of real strawberries in it)
4 eggs
oil called for on box
1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 1/3 cups pureed strawberrie (I blend them and some water in the blender0
2 tsp strawberry extract
It is a very moist cake but its not gummy and it even holds up to carving.
Oh God No...it certainly is not cheating!!!!!!!!!! I am only a scratch baker but if I used Mixes, I wouldn't feel that one was better than the other!!!!! TONS of bakeries use box mixes. I would try it and if it works out for you then Go For It!!!!!!!! Good luck with whatever you decide. At 15 years old, you are so young, you have TONS of time to figure out what is gonna work for you if this turns out to be a long term success for you (which I think it will be)! Keep up the good work hon!
I prefer box mixes for a reason that no one else has talked about so I'm thinking it may be my imagination. I think the preservatives in the box mix helps the cake keep longer than from scratch. This was just my experience when I played with a scratch recipe. I didn't think the cake stayed tasting good as long as the box mix. Am I crazy or is this true?
Wow...I don't know. My scratch cakes never last long enough for me to have ever noticed. I have tons of repeat customers so I am guessing things must be ok. All are moist and not crumbly as some have mentioned here. How long are you talking "Keeping" a cake? The ones I make for us here at home, never last more than 3-4 days. I am going to bake a scratch as well as box cake this weekend (and give the boxed one away to my sister and her kids cause my hubby won't touch it) but I will ask her to report back to me on how it keeps in comparison to my scratch one. Are you talking sitting out on the counter or in the icebox??? I am very interested in this as I have never heard this complaint. Thanks
I never have this issue either melissasmom. I have had people eat my cake a week after it was made.. and this is sitting out in a cake dome.. and said it was still fine other than being a teeny bit dry, but what can you expect for having it sit out for a week right? My hubby and I have had cake that was in the fridge wrapped up for a week too and it was still moist and tasted great and it was just wrapped in plastic with no frosting or anything. I have never had this complaint from any customers either. I did a wedding a long while ago and the MOB said she was eating the leftovers for breakfast for a week.. no complaints about it drying out or being stale.
Well, Jeanne...who ever complains about getting cake for breakfast??? 
not everyone can make a cake from scratch... raises hand.... but then again, not everyone can make a box cake either regardless of how "easy" it is LOL do what works best for you! I'd rather have a box cake that's good, then a scratch cake that's not, or the other way around ya know??? and i too can make sweetdoughs, pies, cookies etc... from scratch. but cake and i just don't get along.
At work my strawberry cake white cake mix, strawberry jello, drained frozen strawberries, and water. Oh it turns out sooooo good. if they'd stop being cheap and buy a better cake mix it would be "da bomb" and then i use the reserve strawberry juice to add to the icing mix. i bake on a military base at one of the dining facilities so i try and hook the soldiers up the best i can with what i have. Oh but i tried it at home, just downsizing the ingredients and it was excellent!!!
Oh I def dont think its cheating. If that's the case, how many of us "cheat" on our pasta dishes! I pop open a bag of dry fettucine and its on!
I also used to work at an upscale hotel and I saw them popping open a box dessert, not a cake, and once I tasted it, I was shocked 'cause it was sooooo de-lish-us!
Now dont get me wrong, a really fantastic scratch cake BAKED by the right person can be some serious mouth fireworks, but its all about people's personal preference. I, myself, love, love, love a "scratch" carrot cake recipe my granny gave me. But everyone doesn't like carrot cake box, scratch or not. I'm not a chocolate cake fan of any kind, so cheating, uh uh girl. Its your preferene as a baker. Just make sure people(customers) roll their eyes in decadence and ask for seconds.
I also used to work at an upscale hotel and I saw them popping open a box dessert, not a cake, and once I tasted it, I was shocked 'cause it was sooooo de-lish-us!
One thing I quickly learned as a caterer is how much superior the restaurant supplier's frozen foods are compared to grocery store frozen foods.
The restaurant supply frozen lasagna I have sampled is SO MUCH BETTER than the same brand frozen lasagna in the grocery. I recently switched to "real" frozen mashed potatoes ... omg, the taste is incredible! Real potatoes that taste much better than mashed potatoes I've had at some people's homes, where they've peeled and cooked them themselves.
So I suggest that some of the anti-mix; anti-frozen sentiments we have and we hear from others is because they've no idea the difference between grocery store items that they stick us housewives with, and the quality restaurant supply items that we caterers get.
I worked for a restaurant years ago that only served frozen petit fours from the restaurant supply place. Everyone went crazy for them and when they were ordered, it was my job to arrange them prettily on a plate, microwave them for 12 seconds, drizzle the plate with pretty syrups and a piece of fresh mint and VOILA!
"Scratch" petit fours. 
It's so funny because I prided myself for years that I am only a "scratch baker" (Just mostly because I have some recipes that I really like and don't like to change) What's funny about it is that for my son's b-day he wanted chocolate cake. I saw that I was out of cocoa and didn't want to make another trip to the store. I had 2 chocolate cake mixes in the cupboard so I used those. Nobody could believe how good it was! I have to say, I even liked it. Now, I just look at it as this way, use them if you have them. Or don't.
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