Bundt Vs Tube Cake Pans: What's The Actual Difference

You don't need a lot of equipment to bake. Aside from a mixer, there's a lot you can do with a bowl, a spoon, and a few simple cake pans and sheet trays. As time goes on, though, we often find ourselves yearning to expand our collection with things like molds, cookie scoops, or perhaps a Bundt pan. Bundt cakes have taken off in recent years, but there is another piece of equipment that their pans often get confused with: tube pans. While the two are very closely related, there are some differences to be aware of.

A tube pan is a specially designed, ring-shaped pan with a hollow, tube-shaped center. It's used for baking tall, airy cakes with straight sides and flat tops, such as a fluffy angel food cake or springy sponge cake. The walls of the tube prevent these types of cakes from sinking in the middle, while the hollow center promotes airflow, helping them bake evenly.

A Bundt pan is a type of tube pan. The shape is similar, but it has fluted sides and a round bottom. The grooves provide even more contact between the pan and the batter, leading to a more structured shape. Apart from that, they're mainly used for decorative reasons. Because of this, Bundt pans tend to suit heavier desserts like classic pound cakes, which show off the details of the designs better. Denser batters also tend to benefit more from the increased surface area, as they take longer to bake uniformly.

You can bake most Bundt cake recipes in a tube pan, but the same isn't always true in reverse. Light angel food cakes and chiffon cakes rely on egg whites rather than traditional leavening agents, so the batter needs to cling to the sides of the pan in order to rise. Many Bundt pans have a nonstick coating, which works against this. Additionally, tube pans are often made with a removable bottom that makes it easier to flip over delicate cakes. If you try to invert an egg white-based cake baked inside of a Bundt pan, it could collapse. Since angel food cakes tend to stick to the sides of the pan, batter could also get stuck in the crevices of the Bundt's grooves, making things messy.

You can use a tube pan for most Bundt cake creations though — just remember that the capacity might be larger and the batter could leak if there are removable parts. Otherwise, feel free to Bundt to your heart's content. Use a tube pan for a sticky toffee pudding Bundt cake or a chocolate cream cheese Bundt cake. Otherwise, give blueberry lemon pound cake or whiskey caramel-glazed coffee cake a new life in a bigger pan. As long as you don't use your Bundt pan for anything too delicate, things should work out okay.