Baker Erin Clarkson is behind the successful blog and Instagram account cloudy kitchen which has more than 255,000 followers.
She joined Jesse Mulligan to share some tips on baking to perfection and her favourite recipes.
Photo: Supplied / Cloudy Kitchen
Firstly, using a scale is important if you want consistency, she says.
"It's something I really push hard for with my baking, which doesn't often go down well with some American readers who only bake in cups.
"American cups and New Zealand cups are actually different volumes. So an American cup is 240ml, New Zealand [cup] is 250ml.
"If you fill that with flour the wrong way, the recipe is not going to go well. So a way for me to minimise that margin of error is by posting everything in grams.
"So if something goes wrong, I can skip past the 'have you got the right quantity of ingredients?' and kind of move on to more troubleshooting."
Erin Clarkson is the baker behind the 'Cloudy Kitchen' blog and Instagram. Photo: Supplied
You can try substituting some ingredients, but make sure it's similar in moisture and texture, she says.
She approves of substituting plain flour and baking power for self-raising flour in a recipe, but not vice versa because of the ratio.
"You can't just switch one for one, but if you do need to make self-raising flour, you can make your own with flour and baking powder."
If you adjust the amount of sugar a recipe calls for, it can end up going wrong because that is what grabs the moisture, she says.
Make sure to bake on the setting mentioned in the instructions, she says, and investing in an oven thermometer would be good.
"I know a lot of people in New Zealand like to use fan bake and if the recipe doesn't call for that, then that can sometimes be a little bit too hot ... for something that has a quick cook time, like a cookie, it can affect the spread.
"I think it's really important if you're not familiar with your oven to really just learn the ins and outs of it and that will help with the accuracy of how things bake."
For things like baked cheesecake, caramel slice or brownies, Clarkson recommends using baking paper as opposed to just greasing the tin.
"I like to extend [the baking paper] over the edges and you can actually clip it on with some bulldog clips and you can sort of use that as a handle to lift the entire thing out... I always go for the insurance, so you butter it and then put a baking paper in."
Her advice for scones is to keep your ingredients cold and don't over mix it.
"The way you get scone layers is from cold butter hitting the hot oven and then that expands and you're going to get nice puffy, flaky scones."
If you want to melt chopped chocolate, you can either do it via short 20 second intervals in the microwave - while stirring in between - or using the bain marie method, she says.
One of her popular recipes has been chocolate chip cookies, which she says tastes much better with chopped chocolate rather than chocolate chips.
"Often bar chocolate is different because it's designed to melt, whereas chocolate chips aren't designed to melt.
"There is a time and place for chocolate chips, but if you like big melty pockets, chop up a bar of what you like to eat and pop that in your cookies."
If you're keen on aesthetics and want even dough balls, Clarkson says use a cookie scooper. Or put a slightly bigger cookie cutter over each piece just after they come out of the oven and move it in a circular motion to pop back in any wonky edges.
Another of her popular recipes has been the burger bun, she says.
"They have a tangzhong base which is an Asian technique, used in Chinese and Japanese cooking, they make a roux with flour and milk which then you add to the dough, and it basically holds onto some of the moisture. So it means you can a really soft but lean dough."
She uses the same recipe to make iced raspberry buns. It can be a little sticky, she warns, but it depends on the flour.
"You just want to bring it together until it's pulling away from the sides of the mixer, and if you're really worried, you can add a teaspoon of flour in.
"I often say set the timer and walk off, because it will look like it's not going to come together but that's the nature of it.
"When you're rolling it out, you can either dust it with a little bit of flour or you can also oil your hands if you want. Just make sure you're using a non-porous countertop.
"Don't be afraid of using a little bit of bench flour, provided you're not working it into the dough."
Some of her other beloved recipes include the peanut butter brownie and pumpkin cinnamon rolls.
