The Freezing Question: Mythbuster style

Partial answers from my own experience.

First of all, to me freezing means using a chest deep freezer NOT connected to a fridge.=The old fashioned kind that need to be manually defrosted to get rid of accumulated ice. 

Fridge freezers dry out cakes something wicked because the air is sucked from them to keep the fridge cold.

Freezing cake baked ahead for scheduling works well.  Both unfrosted and completely buttercream frosted.  All kinds of cake batters you listed.

No change in flavour or texture after 4 weeks, if cake was properly sealed (either completely buttercream iced or wrapped in 2 layers plastic). All types of cake you listed.  Same for cookies FYI both raw and baked.

All cakes MUST be completely cooled to room temperature to wrap or ice or freeze. =Stone cold to the touch.

Bake in morning, fill/cover in afternoon/evening, freeze is my best way for doing ahead.  I do NOT use fondant except on fruitcake which I do not freeze.

If cake is baked 1-2 days before event, no need to freeze IF iced  the same day it was baked.

DO NOT freeze custard pudding or custard buttercream, they weep something gross when thawed.

I know it seems confusing because there are lots of ways people answer all of your questions.  Some refuse to freeze, others always freeze.  Some wrap in multiple layers, others just use one layer.  The thing is, no one has the definitive answer to all of your questions simply because no one has done all the  specific experiments you suggest.  A couple years ago some Wilton forum users did do an experiment on freezing and found no loss of moisture, even when the cake was frozen un covered.  They also froze cake batter and had good results.  The other reason that there are multiple answers is because everyone is right.  If people think their cake is a lesser quality when frozen they are right to not freeze.  I have found no problem with freezing cakes and cupcakes and wrapping in a single layer of plastic wrap in a freezer on top of my fridge, including fully filled and iced buttercream cakes.  Others have had great success with multiple layers of wrap and stick with what has worked for them.  Basically it comes down to what each bakers has good results with and there really is no thing that doesn't work.  There are just too many variables.  So do some research (which clearly you have done) and just give it a try, it really is pretty hard to mess it up.  The big exception being to always use a cake cardboard and dowels/bubble tea straws for a support system.  No way around that.
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazita 

I have found that letting the ccake cool for no more than 10 to 15 minutes than putting a cake board the same size as the cake and turn cake out of the pan, than wrapped well in plastic wrap and freeze it....this forces moister into the cake. I do this even if then cake is due that day or the next day or weeks ahead if time
[IN

I'm afraid that anybody who follow this is going to have problems with cakes that are larger than 12".  Freezing a cake while it's still steaming in the middle will make for a slimy/mushy cake.  Not to mention early burnout of your freezer unit.

So I hope the OP will use some commonsense, because the opinions will continue to be all over the map.  

First of all good baking technique--weighing the flour, using the right kind of flour, mixing correctly--eliminates the need for shenanigans like freezing cakes with their steam.  A well baked cake requires only to cool to room temperature to be delicious without any added icing or topping.  Bake like this, and you can then freeze such cakes without fear of problems. Practise baking single 8" layers of scratch batters because that is enough investment of ingredients to develop good technique. Take such cakes to work if you can't eat them all at home.

If you use cake mixes, use milk or buttermilk instead of water.  It makes a huge difference. But I have switched over to homemade cake mix to be able to control the amount of salt.  These can be made up in bulk (stored in the fridge if you used butter).  They have an excellent texture after baking up with buttermilk and eggs and real extracts.

Use the magic cake strips to get even layers without humps and they are less crusty at the edges.  I bake at 325F and always for less time that the recipe calls for.