A piece of cake: finding the perfect cake tins
Baking the perfect cake means finding the perfect cake tin. Every recipe will advise on the correct width and depth of pan, from a modest square cake tin to a larger 15-inch round cake tin, so it's important to have a range of sizes to hand to ensure the perfect bake.
Traditional metal cake tins are now complemented by a range of silicone, aluminium and springform non-stick pans, often available in a full variety of different novelty shapes and sizes. There are even little sandwich loaf tins or cupcake moulds for parties where individual cakes are preferred.
Novelty cake tins
Children's birthday parties often demand a fun novelty cake, with silicone number and letter moulds perfect for spelling out a special message or showing the birthday girl or boy's age. These reusable cake moulds can be lined with disposable cake lining paper or double-sided silicone paper to ensure that the cake mixture won't stick to the cake moulds, no matter how unusual the novelty cake tin or mould shape is.
Animal moulds are always popular with children, especially dinosaurs and can be reused year after year. Castle, princess and football cakes are made far easier to bake with a novelty tin designed to create the novelty shape with a single bake. Or, show your love with a heart-shaped cake tin, perfect for Valentine's day.
Layer cakes
Rainbow layer cakes are hugely popular for all ages and for all celebrations, and specialist rainbow cake tin sets make it easy to bake all seven colours in one go with specially designed slim tins that can all fit in an oven at the same time. For traditional wedding cakes, however, a nesting stack of cake tins means that it's easy to create a three, four or even five-tier wedding cake with square or round cake tins that will all sit nicely on top of each other once baked.