6 Best Cooling Racks to Cut Down Your Wait Time

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Imagine that you’ve just taken a delicious baked good out of the oven after spending hours preparing it.

The sweet, rich aroma that rushes out of the oven along with the blast of warm air is enough to make your mouth water. It’s finally time to feast on your creation and to share it with your friends and family.

But wait, you’ve got to let this thing cool first. Let the waiting begin.

That waiting period is the most painful part of baking for me, and I know at least a few of you feel the same. Luckily, you can cut down the waiting time with a high-quality cooling rack.

In this post, I’ll go over what makes a cooling rack good and even list six of what I believe are the best cooling racks available.

About Cooling Racks

Why Do You Need a Cooling Rack?

A cooling rack has 4 main purposes:

• Stops foods out of the oven from overcooking – If you put the pan down on a solid surface, it will cool slowly. During that long cooling period, the heat from the pan will continue to cook the food. The result is that the part of the food near the edges of the baking pan will be overcooked and will stick to the pan more.
  
• Saves your counters or wooden surfaces – When you take food out of the oven, the pan is still extremely hot, usually hundreds of degrees. If you put that pan straight onto the counter or another surface, chances are the surface will burn and remain marked up for a long time. Obviously, you don’t want that.
  
• Lets you start enjoying the food more quickly – As I mentioned above, the waiting time between taking baked goods out of the oven and actually getting to serve them from the pan can be excruciating. A cooling rack cuts that time down significantly.
  
• If you opt to actually put the food on the cooling rack while it’s in the oven, the food will often cook more evenly since the hot air can reach the bottom of the food in just the same way as it can reach the other sides. The final product is often crispier and more satisfying.

What to Look for in a Cooling Rack

If you are going to look for a cooling rack to buy on your own, make sure to look at these aspects of the product before handing over your money:

Material

Nearly all of my favorite cooling racks are made from stainless steel. It looks great, it’s sturdy, it has a nice bit of weight, and it has very high temperature resistance.

Aluminum is a cheaper option that functions just as well, although it doesn’t look as nice.

Chrome-plated and wood models are also available, but they don’t have as much heat resistance and tend to get burn-marks easily, especially if you try leaving them in the oven with the food while it’s cooking.

Coating

Some cooling racks come with chrome or non-stick coatings applied to make them look nicer or to make them easier to clean. If you plan to only use the rack for food that’s already come out of the oven, then feel free to get any type of coating.

If you plan to put the rack in the oven while the food is baking, though, go for the uncoated racks or very high quality chrome coating. Experts say that the prolonged extreme heat of an oven can melt most coatings and transfer some very negative health effects to the food.

Size

Make sure the cooling rack will fit in your oven with a comfortable amount of space left over for you to remove it. If you feel you need more space but don’t have room for a bigger baking rack, you can look for a model that can stack on top of itself.

Pattern

Most high-quality cooling racks have a criss-cross mesh pattern rather than a simple slotted pattern. It’s a bit more expensive, but it keeps smaller foods from slipping through the rack.

6 Best Cooling Racks

Instead of considering all the factors that go into making a good cooling rack, you could just go with one or more of the six best cooling racks I’ve listed and categorized in the table below!

Beneath the table, I’ve included a paragraph or two about each model stating why it belongs on the list.

Category	Model	Size
Best Overall	All-Clad Pro-Release Cooling & Baking Rack	16”x11”
Best for Cookies	Expandable Cooling Rack	14”x13.75”-30”
Best for Bread	Stainless Steel Cooling Grids	12”x17”
Best for Cakes	[amazon link=”B08XC7Y6H5″ link_icon=”none” title=”Round Cooling Racks” /]	7.5”, 9”, 10.5” (diameter)
Best Stacking	[amazon link=”B00030CGKY” link_icon=”none” title=”Wilton Excelle Elite 3-Tier Cooling Rack” /]	15.9”x9.9”x3″
Best with Sheet Pan	USA Extra Large Sheet Nonstick Pan And Bakeable Nonstick Cooling Rack Set	20.25”x14.25” (pan size)

1. Overall: All-Clad Pro-Release Cooling & Baking Rack

by Sur La Table

This is my all-time favorite cooling rack because it’s so simple and convenient but still does a remarkable job of distributing heat.

The oversized handles on either side of the rack are the first thing you notice when you look at it. I’m not sure why they’re not on more baking racks, because they make it delightfully easy to grip the pan as you carry it around, even when you’re wearing bulky oven mitts.  Btw if you are i the market for mitts, check out the artilce on best oven mitts.

I don’t usually like baking racks with non-stick finishes, but the one on here is particularly high grade and can withstand temperatures up to 445 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s not high enough to make thick baked goods like bread or cakes, but it’s more than enough for thinner goodies like cookies or brownies.

The heat distribution is very good, too, and most everything I make in here has come out crispy and delicious. If you get one of these, do yourself a favor and oven-cook some crispy bacon on it for a truly transcendent experience. You can thank me later.

2. Best for Cookies: Expandable Cooling Rack

by Sur La Table

The strategy of stacking baking racks on top of each other is not a great idea with cookies, since cookie dough will drip down from the racks and ruin the aesthetics of the cookies beneath them. That’s why this expandable cooling rack is perfect for large batches of cookies.

The carbon-infused steel used to make the rack is durable and can be heated to any temperature, and the high-quality chrome plating can be heated to 575 degrees Fahrenheit without danger of melting.

The rack is only 13.75” wide at its smallest, but it can expand up to 30” so that you won’t have to stack baking racks on top of each other to create a huge surface.

3. Best for Bread: Stainless Steel Cooling Grids

by Sur La Table

Cooling racks that have non-stick coatings are great for baking at low temperatures, but you can’t expose them to very high heat or the coating could melt off onto the food. That’s why this coating-free baking rack is perfect for foods like bread that need to cook at very high temperatures.

It is true that the lack of non-stick coating makes the rack harder to hand wash, but since this model is dishwasher-safe that’s kind of a moot point.

The rack is engineered very well, too. It has a simple design and rounded edges so it’s easy to work with. The mesh making up the surface of the cooling rack is thinner than most competitors, which really helps crisp up the food by exposing as much surface area as possible to the oven’s hot air. Despite being thin, though, the solid steel mesh is extremely durable.

4. Best for Cakes: Round Cooling Racks

by [amazon link=”B08XC7Y6H5″ link_icon=”none” title=”KITCHENATICS” /]

[amazon fields=”B08XC7Y6H5″ value=”thumb” image_size=”large” image_align=”center” image_alt=”Round Cooling Racks”]

When baking a round cake, you should definitely use a round cooling rack it you have one. It’s much easier to work with, and it takes up less space.

All three of the round baking racks included in this set are made from commercial grade 304 stainless steel, so they can withstand the extremely high heats needed to bake cakes and they’re dishwasher-safe.

The racks are also extremely versatile. In addition to oven use, they can be used as steamer racks in pots or as grilling racks to place over an open flame such as a stove or a campfire.

The circular shape of the racks makes them nice and compact, especially when they’re stacked on top of each other, so they’re easy to store. It also makes them super easy to hand wash, since it’s so easy to run a wet rag along the smooth circular mesh. Even though I could just stick them in the dishwasher after using them, I find myself quickly hand washing them most of the time just to save a little space.

5. Best Stacking: Wilton Excelle Elite 3-Tier Cooling Rack

by [amazon link=”B00030CGKY” link_icon=”none” title=”Wilton” /]

[amazon fields=”B00030CGKY” value=”thumb” image_size=”large” image_align=”center” image_alt=”Wilton Excelle Elite 3-Tier Cooling Rack”]

This 3 tier cooling rack is the best tool for cooling a lot of baked goods at once, which is why I’d recommend it for any professional bakers or even home bakers who make several batches at once.

The rack is as thin and easy to store as a single-tier baking rack when it is folded up, but it expands into a 3 tier cooling “rack” that’s really more like a cooling shelf. Each story of the shelf is about as big as a regular cooling rack, so it can accommodate 3 cakes or 3 batches of baked goods at one time.

The black steel of the rack has a nice sleek look to it, especially since the non-stick coating gives it a shiny appearance. The coating also means it’s not an oven-safe cooling rack, but that’s fine since it’s a bit too tall to fit in the oven when unfolded anyway.

6. Best With Sheet Pan: USA Extra Large Sheet Nonstick Pan And Bakeable Nonstick Cooling Rack Set

by Sur La Table

If you don’t have a large oven pan or a matching cooling rack yet, this is the all-in-one buy for you. The cooling rack itself is large enough to cook up big batches of cookies or other baked goods. Since the rack is made from solid steel, it’s oven-safe at any temperature.

The pan is made from aluminized steel and has a nonstick coating. Because of that, it’s easy to clean. The coating may melt off at high temperatures in the oven, but that’s fine since it doesn’t touch the food. The melted coating will harden on the pan again once you’re done baking and the pan cools.

Cooling Rack FAQ

Keep it Cool

So, there you have it: my top picks for the best cooling racks on the market right now. All of these racks are sure to help you keep your kitchen cool and organized —and most importantly, make baking that much more enjoyable.

I hope you found this post helpful, and I can’t wait to see what delicious creations you come up with using one of these fabulous racks!