Anyone who likes to bake a lot may have encountered this problem before: What if you want to fill muffins or cakes? You can put a piece of chocolate in the muffin, but adding cream to the dessert afterwards involves leftover dough and additional work. That’s why Jessica Schilling developed Cucap and is competing in “The Lions’ Den” with her innovative baking molds. They are currently available to buy in sets of 12 or 6.
The amateur baker likes to bake cupcakes, i.e. muffins that are topped with cream. But because that wasn’t enough for her in the long run, she wanted to fill the little cakes too. Hollowing out the muffins and throwing away the cake scraps annoyed her so much that she decided to develop a gadget that would make this step much easier. The Cucap molds are supposed to do exactly that and can be placed in muffins, but also in cakes, so that they can be easily filled without a previous step.
The silicone molds are heat-resistant and fruit acid-resistant (up to 200 degrees Celsius) and can easily be used in deep fryers, ovens, microwaves and even in the freezer. It remains to be seen whether the founder will convince the lions with her kitchen helpers. We have already subjected the product to an everyday test in advance.
The first impression of the product is good: the molds are stable, appear to be of high quality and feel good. But I have to admit: If I hadn’t known beforehand what they were intended for, I wouldn’t have been able to do much with the little pink things. Certainly a matter of taste, but a more neutral color would certainly have done the trick. There isn’t much to consider when using it, and there isn’t much to do wrong either. So: get to the stove.
First prepare the muffin dough as usual and then fill the molds in the muffin tray two-thirds full. Pre-bake the whole thing for five minutes at the usual baking temperature, take it out of the oven and place the cucap molds in the middle. Just not too deep, otherwise there won’t be a hollow, but a hole. Put it back in the oven and let the baking time pass. Once the muffins have been taken out of the oven, you can actually easily pull the silicone molds out of the cake without any cooling time and without the dough sticking to them. What remains is a clean cavity in the muffins. This can easily be filled with chocolate cream, pudding, fruit, cream or something else.
Cleaning is just as easy: Since hardly any dough sticks to the gadgets, there isn’t much to clean and water and dish soap do the rest. Only if something runs into the holes at the top, cleaning is a little more difficult and requires a small brush or something similar. Or, if necessary, they can fit in the dishwasher. You should only avoid agents that are too caustic, as these can damage the surface.
The Cucap molds definitely serve their purpose and make filling (sweet) dishes easier. The little helpers are stable and valuable. The price is certainly fair and reasonable. For hobby bakers, they offer a number of options for making sweet dishes even more sophisticated and are used not only in muffins or cupcakes, but also in other cakes, desserts, ice cream dishes or even in cooking. They are easy and practical to use and prevent dough from being wasted. There is nothing to complain about.
The founder of Cucap is competing in “The Lions’ Den” to expand her business. She offers 25 percent of her company shares for an investment of 120,000 euros. You can see whether the deal between Jessica Schilling and the DHDL investors will come about this evening from 8:15 p.m. on Vox.
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