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Adding moisture to cake recipe from scratch

post #1 of 15
8/25/10 at 4:52am
Thread Starter 
I have a chocolate cake recipe from scratch that I would like to add a little moisture to. I've seen comments about adding pudding to the mix or adjusting the oil but these are always to box mixes. What should/can I do to a from scratch recipe? The cake isn't too dry, but I would like to add a little more moisture to it. I've never added pudding to a recipe before so I would guess I would use chocolate pudding to keep the chocolate taste, but I don't know how much pudding to use or if I need to adjust anything else.

HELP!!!!! icon_smile.gif
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post #2 of 15
8/25/10 at 5:08am
I recently experimented with this a bit. I added some oil and while it was more "moist" it also was obviously oily. At least to me. I didn't try it out on others. The original recipe called for a half-cup of butter. i increased that by 50% up to 3/4 cup. That did the trick in this particular recipe. I've never cooked with pudding mixes. Can't speak to that.
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post #3 of 15
8/25/10 at 5:19am
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I was wondering if I could do something simple like that. The recipe I have uses 2 eggs, 1 cup of milk, and 1/2 cup veg oil.
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post #4 of 15
8/25/10 at 5:48am
I have not tried these myself, but have heard that you could switch to brown sugar instead of white, and maybe add an egg yolk. If I added milk to a chocolate cake I would also either make it chocolate milk or coffee-nothing to do with moisture here, just flavor.

You might just switch to Hershey's recipe (it is here, on CC, in the recipes), it borders on too moist. Or you could just compare it to your recipe and see what is different.
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post #5 of 15
8/25/10 at 5:49am
I bake from scratch a lot too, and I have found that if I add about 1/2 cup of mayo to the batter it helps a lot. You can also try sour cream. Hope that helps.
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post #6 of 15
8/25/10 at 5:57am
I substituted sour cream for the milk in my recipe. It was UNBELIEVABLY moist and delicious. After it was eaten at a function, I got a lot of phone calls requesting the cake for other family events. I'm gonna be tired. icon_wink.gif
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post #7 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:07am
Thread Starter 
Thank you all so vry much for the help. I am going to try both substituting sour cream for the milk and I am going to compare it to the Hershey recipe and see which of the two I prefer.

This was great information!!!!!! I'm so glad to have found this site with such helpful people!!!! thumbs_up.gif
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post #8 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:18am
I tried adding pudding mix to my cake and it made it unpleasantly gummy. Has that happened to anyone here?
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post #9 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:23am
Thread Starter 
Now I've never heard of that happening with pudding. I look forward to what people have to say about this...
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post #10 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:33am
Quote:
Originally Posted by FACSlady

I tried adding pudding mix to my cake and it made it unpleasantly gummy. Has that happened to anyone here?


I've got an OLD family recipe for a buttermilk chocolate cake I add an instant pudding mix to and it isn't gummy at all. How much instant pudding are you adding? Maybe you need to cut back to 1/2 box.
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When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, "I used everything you gave me". Erma Bombeck
~~~
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post #11 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:34am
Yes, I added an entire small box. Maybe less would work better. Thanks.
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post #12 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:43am
How long do you bake the cake? It could be you are overbaking just a wee bit and your recipe is fine.

Switching out for sour cream does make a moist cake. However, in Bakewise she recommends adding 1/3 cup of milk for every cup of sour cream because of the density and fat level of the sour cream.

I have found substituting buttermilk for milk gives it a richer flavor, but not necessarily a moister cake.

And how do you make the cake? The process you use will determine how moist your cake comes out too.

There are a lot of factors to consider other than just the ingredients. If you post the recipe and process, it may shed light on why they are not quite as moist as you like. But my first guess is the baking time.
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post #13 of 15
8/25/10 at 6:54am
The other trick, believe it or not, is to freeze the cake for any amount of time from 1 day to several weeks. Something about freezing the cake, crystallizing the moisture in the cake, then thawing it, makes the cake more moist than if it had not been frozen. Strange, but true.
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post #14 of 15
8/25/10 at 7:14am
FACS,
Did you add instant pudding or regular (cooked) pudding?
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post #15 of 15
8/25/10 at 10:37am
Instant.
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