To unmould, in cooking, is getting something you made out of the vessel you made it in, and attempting to do so in one piece. It is also the point at which all your hard work is mostly likely to go pear-shaped.
You can unmould cakes, ice-creams, dessert or savoury jellies, or savoury items such as timbales.
- Lining cake pans with greaseproof or waxed paper, or greasing and flouring the cake pan, can help make unmoulding the cake easier;
- With a cake, running a knife along the edge sometimes helps;
- Springform pans certainly make unmoulding cakes easier;
- For frozen items such as ice cream, or gelatins, unmoulding techniques range from first dipping the mould in cold water and then slightly warm water then turning it over onto a plate. Some people advise that the warm water dip should be a last-ditch effort if all else fails;
- Some people take blow torches to the sides of a jelly that they are trying to unmould;
- Terrines for Pâtés can be lined for plastic wrap, if it’s a terrine that doesn’t require cooking.