HOW TO SELECT THE BEST BAKING OVEN RACK POSITION
Updated: Feb 11, 2023
How effectively your baked goods cook and brown is greatly influenced by the placement of your oven rack. This article explains how your oven generates heat, offers advice on how to bake on many racks at once, and specifies which rack to use for various types of baked goods.
Your recipe's success depends just as much on the components you use and your capacity to combine them as it does on the oven rack position you decide to employ to bake your cookies, pies, cakes, and other baked products.
The difference between cookies with burnt or golden brown bottoms and cakes with cooked or undercooked inside can be determined by understanding how the heat in your oven operates and selecting the proper location accordingly.
While the middle is frequently a "safe choice," depending on the specific recipe you are baking, the top or bottom may be preferable. The greatest way to make a pie perfect is to move it about the oven while it's baking.
Continue reading to learn why understanding oven rack position is crucial for developing your baking abilities, instructions on what to bake where, how rotating pans and moving racks helps produce an even bake, and how to bake on several racks.
HOW OVEN RACK POSITION AFFECTS YOUR BAKING
How an Oven Produces Heat
The majority of electric and gas ovens have two heat sources—one on top and one underneath. Both heating components turn on when the oven is turned on to preheat.
The top element turns off when the oven reaches the desired temperature, while the bottom element alternates between turning on and turning off to keep the temperature at or near the setting you selected when you turned the oven on. For instance, if you set your oven to 350°F, the temperature will fluctuate during the baking cycle between 325°F and 375°F, but it will average out at 350°F.
What Works Best at the Top, Middle, and Bottom
Most ovens feature two racks that can be placed in one of four or five different positions. (Bottom, Middle, Bottom Third, Top, Top Third) Set your racks in the ideal positions for the items you are baking before you begin. Then, to attain and maintain the temperature you specified, preheat your oven for around 20 minutes.
When in doubt or if your recipe doesn't specify the rack location (which is what most do), use these recommendations to determine where is ideal for the item you are baking.
TOP OVEN RACK
Use the top rack of the oven for items that you want to brown evenly and with a crusty top. For things like finishing pies with a top crust, casseroles, baked macaroni and cheese, gratins, crisps, and garlic bread, the top of the oven is great. During the last minute or two of baking, turn on the broiler for even more color.
MIDDLE OVEN RACK
The middle rack is the default setting when deciding where to put your meal. When baking one rack at a time, the middle rack will generally cook and bake all food evenly. Food is uniformly surrounded by airflow. There is no risk of burning or browning on the tops or bottoms. Cakes, single-tray cookies, brownies, sheet pan dinners, and fish all taste well on this middle rack.
BOTTOM OVEN RACK
Use the bottom of the oven to bake items that you want to be deeply browned on the bottom, such as pizza crusts, crusty breads, roasted vegetables, and pie crusts.
Baking: Rotating and Moving
It will assist baked items to bake more evenly and produce the desired outcomes if you move them around. You don't have to continue baking on the same rack just because you started there. For instance, an apple pie crust needs to be golden brown on both the bottom and top, and the filling needs to be fully cooked. Start your apple pie on the bottom rack so that the bottom gets crisp, then move it to the center after approximately 10 minutes, and finally, when it's almost done, transfer it to the top third to complete the top crust.
Move the pie to a lower rack if you see that the top is browning too quickly, even on the middle rack.
Put your cookies on a higher rack if the bottoms are browning too soon.
To ensure that baked goods cook uniformly, rotate cakes, cookies, and pies 180 degrees midway through baking. This corrects for hotspots where your oven may have some areas that are warmer than others.
Cakes shouldn't be moved until they've had time to set (at least 30 minutes). Moving them while they are still liquid will harm their growing structure.
Information on What to Bake Where in the Oven in Detail
BISCUITS: Middle
BISCOTTI: Middle
BREADS: Crusty bread is best baked on the bottom so that the texture is crispy on the outside and softer on the inside; Quick slices of bread like banana bread are best in the bottom third
BROWNIES: Middle
CAKE: Use the middle rack when cake is thin (1 -3 inches) to avoid the cake from burning and for a softer, fluffier texture; Position rack in the lower third of the oven for cakes that are thicker (4 inches or higher like bundt, angel food cake, or pound cakes) so that the center of the cake still sits in the center of the oven which will help them to be cooked evenly and not be soupy or uncooked on the inside; Bake single thin sheet cakes (like for a jellyroll) in the middle of the oven.
CHEESECAKE: Bake in the middle of oven either with a shallow pan full of water on the lower rack or with the cheesecake pan sitting in a water bath
COFFEE CAKE: Middle
COOKIES: Single sheets of cookies should be baked in center of the oven. Rotate sheet 180 degrees a little over halfway through baking time.
CROISSANT: Middle
CUPCAKES: Middle CUSTARD: Top third MUFFINS: Middle PIE: Start the pie on the bottom rack for about 10 minutes to brown the bottom crust, move it to the center rack for the majority of the baking, and then finish on the top rack for about 10 minutes to get a flakey, golden brown crust
PASTRIES: Middle
PUFF PASTRY: Upper third
QUICHE: Lower third so that the bottom crust will be crisp and the edges and top won't become over-brown.
SCONES: Start in the upper third of the oven to brown and puff them and then about halfway through baking time move the sheet to the middle rack to cook all the way through
SOUFFLE: Upper third because they require intense heat to bake and reach maximum volume
TART: Bottom third TURNOVERS: Middle to upper third depending on how brown you want them
Choosing the proper oven position when baking can significantly affect how your baked goods seem once they are taken out of the oven and makes sure that they are thoroughly cooked.
Comments