Ignoring cooking instructions can have disastrous consequences as demonstrated by these comical cake fails.
From runny icing to sunken middles and burnt edges, the disastrous sugar-infused centerpieces do little to whet the appetite.
The images are courtesy of Flickr users who, instead of hiding their culinary mishaps, willingly posted them online to serve as a lesson to other aspiring bakers.
Runny disaster: A banana and toffee pudding cake with maple syrup buttercream turns into a sloppy mess
One photo of a banana and toffee pudding cake with maple syrup buttercream, looks like it is plunging into a sinkhole as it sits in a puddle of butter-colored icing.
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And a cherry upside-down cake, complete with a burnt crust, is pictured alongside a metal spatula - suggesting the implement was needed to hack it out of the rusting tin.
Remember to grease the tin: A metal spatula was needed to dig this cherry upside-down cake out
Sugary eruption: This molten chocolate lava cake bubbles over
But it's not just the appearance of the baked goods which offers a source of entertainment.
The iced messages that many of them feature also contain hilarious spelling errors - highlighting that many chefs could do with a dictionary in the kitchen.
One graduation cake reads 'congratulations Sean on your degaree' while a wedding creation is topped with the word 'congradulations David and Sarah'.
Animal-inspired: One baker got creative with the icing on this bright pig cake
Quick solution: Not wanting to spend too much time slaving away in the kitchen, one chef merely stacks up pancakes and tops them with lollies, icing and candy
Jennifer Yates from Orlando, Florida has dedicated the past five years to spotting cake decorating howlers.
In 2008 she set up a blog called Cake Wrecks and went on to publish a book under the same name.
Every week she receives hundreds of hilarious examples of catastrophic efforts from bakers around the world.
Congradulations vs. congratulations: Hopefully the happy couple were too busy celebrating to notice the error
Word of advice: The baker behind this cake could use a dictionary in the kitchen
She said that misspellings are the most common blunder.
'You have to wonder what was going through the baker's mind on some of these,' she explained.
Ranging from the grammatically challenged to the downright weird, Mrs Yates became 'hooked' on cake fails after her husband, John, signed them both up for cake decorating lessons.
Botched art work: This cake was meant to read Happy Birthday Dad, but the frosting smeared last-minute
Cunning disguise: But with the lights out and candles lit the birthday boy probably won't notice
She started her blog in May 2008 and said she was surprised by the popularity of the site.
' I started the Cake Wrecks blog . . . it was always just for fun.
'I never thought anyone other than a few friends would read it.'