Secrets of the home pastry chefs

We''ll be happy to share with you some tips and tricks that will make it easier to prepare cakes and other desserts. You know where it starts? The mise en place.

1. "Mise en place."

Mise en place means that all the ingredients are prepared, softened, melted, sifted and measured before you start baking. This is a great opportunity to check all your ingredients and make sure you really have everything you need. Let''s not underestimate this step. There is nothing worse than running out of oil or sugar in the middle of a recipe.

2. Mix the sugar and butter.

Some recipes call for mixing butter and sugar. This means whipping the butter with the sugar (usually with an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment) to aerate the mixture. For best results, the butter should be softened to room temperature. Cold butter will be too hard to aerate.

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Beat the butter and sugar for 3 to 5 minutes on medium speed. If the butter is at room temperature, after 3 minutes you will notice that the mixture is pale in colour and slightly fluffy.

3. Add the lemon zest.

Before stirring the sugar into the butter, consider whether or not your recipe contains fruit zest. Rub the fruit peel into the crystal sugar to release all the essential oils. This will add a different level of flavour to our confectionery products. We add the main flavour to the sugar and this flavour will spread through the butter into our desserts.

4. What about other spices?

In the same way that we make the most of our lemon zest and herbs, we can enhance the flavour with spices! Most recipes call for ground spices to be mixed into flour or eggs. If you whisk the spices into the butter and sugar mixture, the flavours will also meld with the butter. Bonus: fat is great for transferring flavour.