Precision

Precision.  It's what makes baking work at it's best most of the time.

I love things like the roulade in the photo above.  This roulade looks so neat and precise.  When I cut it into pieces that are nearly the same size, the pieces will look amazing lined up in a row.

When I make something like this roulade, the precision in the measuring of ingredients is exceedingly important.  If a recipes call for one cup of flour .... well, how much is one cup of flour?  I've done a previous blog post on this exact topic which shows the variation in weight of a quantity of flour as measured by volume depending on how you scoop out the flour.  The weight variation can be significant.

If 140 grams of flour is needed, then does it matter if it's 142 or 138?  I've never noticed that a small variation of a gram or two is significant, but certainly ten grams is significant depending on what is being made.  Ten grams variation in a batch of cookie dough may not change the final product much.  But ten grams variation in a roulade is more significant.  

Precision in portioning of doughs and batters is also important.  It's a lot more likely that every cookie on the baking sheet will bake to the same "doneness" if they are all the same size.  So weighing the amount of cookie dough in every ball of dough to ensure that each cookie has the same weight makes the baking process a lot easier and your baking times a lot more reliable.  

What I ultimately like about the precision required in baking is that when one is precise in measuring, in shaping, in baking time, etc., there is an amount of certainty that comes from this.  (Breads can be another story due to daily variations in ambient temperature and humidity and other things, but that's a post for another day.)  Being able to rely on precision to have the same result virtually every time you use a recipe is something I find very important and very satisfying in a world that is constantly beset with uncertainty.