After making several trial on some (if not a lot) recipes, I think, it’s best to choose recipe that is created in our own ‘country’ because the recipe is made and tried based on weather in that country. It may not work in other places.
Yet, yes, there is few recipes that can be applied to most weather in any country. I recommend MICHAEL LIM youtube channel. Even so, some of his recipes are at advanced level (like macaron). So, may be it won’t work for us to do (his macaron recipe doesn’t work for me, yet other recipes most most mostly ok, even slightly-advanced cake level like roll cake.
I lived in Asia but apparently, I don’t feel that a Japanese chef (youtuber)’s recipe works for me. Somehow, her cake is dry. But, other cakes are ok for me and she created fillings that is good. I haven’t tried it yet but her non-baked cake looks intriguing. I wanted to try it next time. I’m not sure about her regular cake. I have made some of them and don’t like the texture. May be it’s ok in her country but in my place, somehow, it’s drier than her cake.
Also, choose the recipe based on the season. Check your humidity; mark your months of season. While ago, i couldn’t bake a specific roll cake type no matter how, what, i can’t. Then, it comes high humidity season. All of sudden, i can make it. I traced back my baking (and it also appeared on my facebook time line), I found that I was succeeded in making it when humidity is high and i then remembered, before i finally succeeded, I was having difficulty making it. I think, it was times cut off between low and high humidity. Now, it’s also amazing that recipe that i could make at low humidity, it doesn’t working anymore now (at high humidity). Hahahaha.
Also, sometimes, when we get used to make 1/2 recipe and then we make full recipe, it can be another ‘new experience’. It doesn’t guarantee we will succeed like when we make 1/2 recipe. Why? Because we must adjust the baking time and/or temperature. Even though in recipe there is baking time and temperature for full recipe but usually we still have to adjust it with our own oven. Because we already mastered our 1/2 recipe, we might adjust it started from that 1/2 recipe baking time and temperature. It’s not as easy as it seems.
Also, using different oven, electric or non electric can be problem. Like in my case, when i want to bake full recipe, i need bigger oven which is a non electric one. I haven’t consistently succeed. But with electric oven, I can be succeeded more consistently, yet, i’m limited up to 28×28 cm pan/mould. haha. *Back to previous paragraph, even though i can make full recipe, yet I’m not used to it because i was afraid to use full recipe and failed. So, even with same electric oven, i must learn again to make a full cake recipe.
So, don’t give up in baking, Just pay attention on your work and keep digging. Have some talk with some friends may open our eyes, too. I was thinking about humidity very slightly but my friend who is a clay artist mention humidity with confident. I then rethought again. Could it be (really) it? It is.