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The Best Baking Tutorials

These are the Best Baking Tutorials that you’ll use time and time again. You’ll find my favorite tutorials for baking and decorating cakes, cupcakes and sugar cookies as well as the best tips for making pie crusts. Whether you’re an experienced baker or a beginning baker, there’s something here for everyone. 

The internet is full of baking tutorials and how-tos, and I have done my fair share of Googling. Instead of going to Google every time I am looking for my favorite and most-used tutorials, I am rounding them all up here for you. These are tried and true and all tutorials I’ve used myself. 

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Here are 15 of the Best Baking Tutorials that every baker needs!

Best Frosting Tutorials

Every good cupcake needs a tried and true frosting recipe. I’ve made a LOT of frosting throughout the years and I didn’t really even like frosting until I started making my own.

Perfect Vanilla Frosting

My Perfect Vanilla Frosting has been one of the most popular vanilla frosting recipes on Google since it came out in 2014. At the time, there was no other recipe that called for starting with cold butter. It’s been my secret-not-so-secret tip ever since.

A small jar of piped vanilla buttercream with a full piping bag sitting next to it

How to Make Buttercream

If you’re looking for a detailed guide for How to Make Buttercream, I posted over 2000 words because I am simply obsessed with making the very best frosting recipes.

A close up view of a cake decorate with buttercream flowers and buttercream roses

How to Use a Piping Bag

One you’ve made all your frosting prepared and it’s time to decorate, check out all the tips for How to Use a Piping Bag with tips for filling the bag, using different size piping tips and couplers. 

A piping bag folded over a hand, while the other hand is using a spatula to fill the bag

How to Color Buttercream

Don’t forget that sometimes we need to color our frosting. Be sure to check out my complete guide for How to Color Buttercream Frosting. I detail all the tools needed, different types of gels and tips for being successful.

An overhead shot of a bowl of white frosting, and there's piping tips and color gels laying around the bowl

How to use Piping tips

This helpful tutorial for How to Use and Decorate with piping pips. I detail all the different piping tips you can use and different designs you can make with them. 

A collage image of decorated cupcakes, a piping bag and piping tips

How to Decorate the Perfect Cupcake

Finally, once you’ve nailed your buttercream recipe, you need to know How to Decorate the Perfect Cupcake– bakery style with mile high, beautifully piped frosting. In this post I break down all the different piping tips you need along with a step by step video.

A cupcake frosted with an Ateco 846 Piping Tip, a Closed Star Tip

 

Best Tutorials for Baking Cakes and Cupcakes

In the early days of my blog, most of my recipes called for Cake Mix. I think that every baker should have the opportunity to make amazing desserts, even if it means using a cake mix.  So finally I put out my Cake Mix Guide which talks all about the different cake mixes available on the market and how they compare.  

Completed Guide to Cake Mix

All your boxed cake mix questions answered. This is the best guide for what types of cake mix to choose. What cake mix is the most chocolaty? What cake mix has the best rise? I’m answering all your questions.

How to Bake Cupcakes

One of the very early early blog posts I published was a result of all my cupcake baking. I called it Cupcake Research For Bakers, but really it’s a detailed guide on baking cupcakes in all the different size pans you’ll find on the shelves. It talks about the baking times and difference between the pans available.

Tip and Tricks for making perfect cupcakes. This is your go-to guide for how to bake cupcakes including pan sizes and how full to fill each liner.

I’ve always loved baking cakes, but layer cakes can be intimidating. The more and more I work with layer cakes, the more comfortable I have become with them. However, there’s a few very helpful posts out on there to get you started with make cakes. My friend Lindsay is so talented, she has the best cake tutorials. 

How to Frost a Smooth Cake with Buttercream

How to frost a smooth cake

How to fill and stack cakes

How to fill a stacked cake

How to Store Layer Cakes

I get lots of questions about freezing cake layers. While I usually don’t freeze cake layers myself, Mandy How to Store Layer Cakes in the freezer. The method she described is very similar to what we did at the bakery I worked at in high school.

how to store cake layers

My favorite Tutorials for Sugar Cookies

I am pretty much obsessed with sugar cookies that are frosted with buttercream frosting. Over the years, I’ve posted numerous tutorials about How to Make Sugar Cookies and my best Tips and Tricks for Sugar cookies.

A plate full of gorgeous sugar cookies decorated with buttercream in purple, teals, white and pink frosting.

One you have baked your sugar cookies, of course you have to decorate them! I’ve shared all my Tips for Decorating Sugar Cookies with Buttercream frosting. Spolier alert, it starts with my Perfect Vanilla Frosting.

The Best Tips for Making Cheesecake and Pies

When I wrote my cookbook, No-Bake Treats I made dozens and dozens of desserts in my handy springform pan. At one point, I was intimidated by springform pans, but I learned a lot along the way. So I’ve shared this step-by-step tutorial on How to make a No-Bake Crust in a Springform Pan.

How to make a No-Bake Crust in a Springform Pan.

A hand using a measuring cup to press the Oreo crumbs into a springform pan

Pie crusts are not my thing, I’ve always relied on the tutorials from my fellow bloggers for How to Make the Perfect Pie Crust. Are you team butter or team Crisco? How about a combination of the two? 

How to Make the Perfect Pie Crust

How to Make the Perfect Pie Crust

How to Blind Bake a Pie Crust.

If you are making a custard pie, like my To-Die-For Coconut Cream Pie, then you need to know How to Blind Bake a Pie Crust. It was so frustrating to me when my pie crust always shrank in the pan and suddenly the sides were so much lower than I needed. Sally’s method for blind baking pie crusts changed the game for me! 

How to Blind Bake A pie Crust

How to prevent your cheesecake water bath from leaking

Cheesecake are my FAVORITE dessert, and I don’t often make cheesecakes at home. Truth be told, the whole water bath thing was always intimidating to me. However, when Lindsay shared her tutorial in How to prevent your cheesecake water bath from leaking, I found it to be one of the best tips I’ve ever seen for baking cheesecakes.

How-to-prevent-waterbath-from-leaking-cheesecake11

Just for Fun Tutorials

I saw this tutorial How to Toast Coconut and realized it included an option for toasting coconut on the stovetop and it was mindblowing! No need to preheat the oven! 

Do you need to brown butter? Let me show you step-by-step instructions for How to Brown Butter.

I love Sally’s tip for How to clean your silicone baking mats! As much as I LOVE my silicone baking mats, they aren’t always the easiest thing to clean. Sally offers several options for cleaning one of my most treasured baking tools.  

The only thing I haven’t tried is making my own sprinkles, but I love how Bakerella shows you can  How to Make Your Own Sprinkles at home!

How to Make Your Own Sprinkles

 

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2 thoughts on “The Best Baking Tutorials”

  1. Avatar photo
    linda of no.cal.

    ThANk. YoU. !! I can eat butter creme frosting all but itself… LoL
    The picture of the butter cream frosting in the glass… Y.U.M.
    Gotta try your sugar cookie recipe. My bestie, Anita, is THE baker in our group… she has made numerous goodies from YOUR recipes… DOUBLE tHAnk. yOu. !!