Running out of baking ingredients halfway through a recipe is annoying but many swaps can save the day. Fast breads and muffins well tolerate changes in ingredients. Although modifying cookies, bars or cakes risks different texture or flavor you can reach nice results.
Crushed banana, applesauce or canned pumpkin purée replace eggs in many recipes, giving light fruit flavor and moisture. Unsweetened applesauce serves as egg replacement, that adds nutrition and makes the recipe vegan. Crushed banana are especially practical because it also replaces butter and oil.
Easy Baking Ingredient Swaps
You can use it one-for-one in any recipe to get wet, cakey strucutre. Aquafaba, the liquid from a can of chickpeas, is another common egg substitute. It binds the ingredients and ensures moisture without changing the taste.
Even so egg substitutions most commonly alter the texture and cooking times.
Baking powder and baking soda are not easy one-for-one swaps. Because baking soda is three to four times stronger than baking powder, too much can create problems. For every spoon of baking powder, take quarter spoon of baking soda mixed with half spoon of cream of tartar.
Self-rising flour already has baking powder so it also works as alternative. If you exchange baking powder for baking soda, use two to three times more, and even then some baked goods might not rise.
Change of liquid sugar for white sugar makes the baked goods heavy and too soggy. At home you can prepare light brown sugar mixing cups of white granulated sugar with tablespoon of molasses. Granulated sugar with molasses instead of brown sugar gives more crisp and sweet results.
Change of white flour for another flour usually happens one-for-one. But replacing white flour with brown or whole wheat flour is much more hard. Wheat has gluten, that gives elasticity and keeps cookies and cakes together.
Almond flour does not work as one-for-one replacement for white flour in recipes.
To replace heavy cream, use half a cup of cream from coconut milk for every half cup of heavy cream. Melted butter mixed with milk also works well as cream substitution. As dairy-free alternative for Greek yogurt, silken tofu adds protein, moisture and neutral taste in one-for-one proportion for baked goods.
In recipes where butter stabilizes, such as no-bake desserts or frostings, you cannot replace it with oil. Jam or fruit purée can create marble effect in cakes, breads or tarts. Fresh fruit nicely decorates desserts.