Being able to bake well is becoming a bit of an obsession for me.  I have a long way to go to being really proficient at it.  I don’t think that I’ve yet baked what I would consider to be the perfect cake.  Perfect in the sense that it is the shape and size it is supposed to be.

My baking disasters are not about taste.  Even when my Victoria sponges crash and burn they are still edible and taste good.  It’s just that they have to be reconstructed or sculptured somewhat for them to look like a cake should.  I’d set off on an experimental baking odyssey if it wasn’t for the fact there are only two of us to eat the cake.  It could be potentially disastrous for our waistlines.

With some rhubarb in the fridge I thought I’d make a Rhubarb Cake.  How much harder could this be than the Rhubarb and Walnut muffins I’ve mastered.  I followed the recipe to the letter and on first impressions the outcome looks promising.

This has three main components – a base cake layer, rhubarb and then a streusel topping.  It was easy to make and came out of the over looking the golden brown it should.  And then this.

Whilst the layers are definitely there it seems that the cake has not baked upwards in the way it should.  It’s certainly thinner than I expected.  Oh why does this happen to me?

I won’t be put off though.  I’m going to keep practising.

In the meantime, I got distracted with the camera and started to experiment with the aperture settings to see whether I could make my cake look any better by varying the f/stops.  It’s this that determines the depth of field in the photograph and how much is in focus and how much is not.

Look at these.  See how the background gets clearer and clearer.

The f/stop varied from f/5.6, f/9, f/14 and f/32.  Don’t ask me to explain this any more – you see numbers are not my friend and I’ve only just worked this all out after copious amounts of reading and experimenting.

I will say that the Rhubarb Cake doesn’t look as bad as I fear when I cut into it.  It tasted good too.  I took some to a friends as my morning tea contribution.  They seemed to like it too.

Of the close ups, I liked this one the most.

Looking close up I think I can detect my baking problem too.  Oven a little too hot maybe as the base of the cake is definitely brown.  Must experiment with oven settings next time. See a photo study of a cake can have dual purpose.

I’ve become a little fixated with food photography recently.  Not the overly styled sort of food photography but the raw in the kitchen type photography by other bloggers.  There’s some amazing work out there to keep me inspired that it’s possible to do better.

But first I’ve got to bake the perfect cake. That may take some time but I’ll have some fun trying!