Preparing a cake pan for baking

This ultimate no-fail non-stick technique can be applied to any sort of pan or project — standard layer cakes, flourless cakes, fruitcakes, brownies, you name it. It’s incredibly easy to do provided you have some parchment paper on hand. Flat sheets are the easiest to work with. I order pre-cut half-sheet pieces from King Arthur flour. They’re expensive but worth it, at least to me. There’s a short stack laying flat on top of my fridge at all times, ready for action.

So then, to begin you’ll need a cake pan, a pencil, scissors, a can of non-stick cooking spray and a sheet of baking parchment.

Start by tracing your cake pan in pencil in the corner of the sheet (there are more elegant origami-like techniques for achieving this result, but I’m a big dumb guy and I like simplicity). Don’t worry, graphite-phobes, the pencil lines won’t touch the food.

Cut out your circle just inside the line.

Next cut a two-to-three-inch strip down the length of the sheet (this is for the side of the pan):

But since that won’t be long enough to go all the way around the pan, do the same along what’s left of the short end of the sheet:

Give the interior of the pan a good coating of non-stick spray.

Lay your bottom in…

The your sides/edges beginning with the long piece….

…and then the “patch”, trimming it so there’s no excess. You want it completely stuck to the pan walls (pretty nifty how the cooking spray does that, eh?).

Give the whole mess one more good coating of cooking spray…

…and voilà, she iz ready. Pretty, no? I’d like to see anything, anything stick to this. Get in the habit and you’ll never spend $45 on a fancy non-stick springform pan again.