ADear fellow cake bakers, I am getting really frustrated - my cakes are dropping in the middle when they come out of the oven and shrivelling up! Having checked the other forums, it seems this is a common problem with cupcakes and packet recipes but I bake from scratch (100g margarine, sugar, self raising flour, 2 eggs per section, 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1tbsp milk).

They rise beautifully in the oven but end up level topped within a few minutes of emerging. This never happened before a few weeks ago. So far, I have checked the oven temperature: fine, checked the cake was cooked through: overcooked a test on purpose and no change, taken out the baking powder to see if it was 'overrising', no difference....I'm now all out of ideas!! The taste is fine although perhaps not as light as they are when not collapsed. The only other thing is people have mentioned 'Over beating' - I beat the butter for 3 minutes with the sugar on '4' (kitchen aid), add the eggs, then added the flour until just combined before the milk. Does that sound too much?

Would be really grateful for any advice here, there is only so much cake experiment I can eat myself! Thanks in advance! :-)

AIt think you should try adding the eggs last... After the flour and mix on low for a minute.