What can you do if you cook and suddenly do not have enough sugar or there are no breadcrumbs in the cupboard? Run to a neighbor or shop? No! You can find a replacement for a missing product.
Key ingredients
Many products have, if not identical, similar tastes, especially after thermal treatment. So if you’re cooking salt and haven’t bought capers, don’t be upset. You can give the soup the desired sourness with olives or pickled gherkins. Or, for example, if you need white wine to stew meat and it’s not in the fridge, just replace it with chicken broth.
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Sometimes we know what we can replace. For example, known interchangeable ingredients are lemon juice and vinegar, baking powder, and hash soda. But how much of one ingredient corresponds to another? You’ll also find clues in proportions where it’s important.
Dairy products and eggs are part of many dishes. Most dairy products are interchangeable. Complexities are only with English-language recipes.
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For example, cottage cheese – crumbly, with a pronounced milky taste – in the West is considered a variety of young soft cheese. There, grainy cottage cheese is called village cheese – cottage cheese, and sour cream (sour cream) to taste and consistency more like Greek yogurt. It is also impossible to put a mark of equality between buttermilk and kefir or rye. However, all Western dairy products can be replaced.
Sauces play an important role in cooking. Most of them are sold in the finished form. But if you forgot to buy Tabasco or mayonnaise – it does not matter. You can find a way out.
Do not throw away the recipe, if a dressing is not the usual olive oil, but, for example, sesame oil or Chinese vinegar, they have alternatives.
Baking is the highest aerobatics in cooking. Not everyone is friends with the dough and oven. Many believe that when cooking sweet and unsweetened baking should strictly follow the recipe, otherwise it will not work. It’s true. But, if the kitchen suddenly did not have baking powder or flour for muffins, it does not mean that the homemade buns or pies will have to give up. Most of the ingredients in baking recipes are replaceable.
| Ingredient | Proportion | Replacement |
| Agar-agar | 1 г | 8g gelatin |
| Arrowroot | 1 tsp. | 2 tbsp flour or 1 tbsp cornstarch |
| Vanilla (pods) | 1 stick (5 cm) | 1 tsp vanilla extract |
| Vanillin (powder) | 1 sachet | Vanilla in pods, vanilla sugar, or a couple of drops of vanilla essence |
| Wine stone | 1/2 tsp. | 11/2 tsp lemon juice or table vinegar |
| Ready baking mixture | 1 cup | Half a cup of flour, half a cup of shortening, 21/2 tsp baking powder, and 3/4 tsp salt |
| Yeast pressed | 1/2 pack | 2 tbsp dry yeast |
| Dry yeast | 1 tbsp. | 25g pressed yeast |
| Cocoa powder | 4 ст. л. | 30g unsweetened dark chocolate |
| Ammonium carbonate | 1 tsp. | 1 tsp baking powder |
| Coconut cream | Cream | |
| Coconut milk | Cow’s milk | |
| Coconut shavings | 1 tbsp. | 11/2 tbsp fresh grated coconut |
| Corinna (dark raisins without bone) | Other types of raisins or shredded dates | |
| Cornstarch | 1 tbsp. | 2 tbsp wheat flour; 2 tbsp tapioca (manioca sago); 21/2 tsp arrowroot |
| Light corn syrup | 1 cup | A glass of honey or a glass of sugar plus 1/4 cup of water |
| Dark corn syrup | 1 cup | A glass of maple syrup or 3/4 cup light corn syrup plus 1/4 cup of molasses (black molasses) |
| Carob (carob pods) | 1 tbsp. | 1 tbsp cocoa powder |
| Marzipan | 21/2 cup | 2 cups chopped almonds, 1 cup powdered sugar, and 2 tbsp corn syrup |
| Marshmallow | Marshmallows | |
| Melissa (black molasses) | 1 cup | A glass of honey or 3/4 cup of sugar plus 1/4 cup of water |
| Honey | 1 cup | A glass of corn syrup; 11/4 cup sugar plus 1/4 cup water; an incomplete glass of buttermilk plus 2 tbsp melted shortening |
| Flour for muffin | 1 cup | An incomplete glass of wheat flour of the highest grade (you can add 2 tbsp cornstarch) |
| Flour confectionery | Bakery flour of the highest or first grade | |
| Self-in-a-half flour (ready mixture of flour, salt and baking powder) | 1 cup | Glass of wheat flour of the highest grade, 11/2 tsp baking powder and 1/2 tsp salt |
| Potato flour | 1 tbsp. | 2 tbsp wheat flour of the highest grade or 1 tbsp cornstarch |
| Corn flour | Wheat flour of the highest grade | |
| Maize flour (masa harina) | Corn flour | |
| Rye flour | Wheat flour of the highest grade | |
| Rice flour | 1 cup | An incomplete glass, glass of wheat flour of the highest grade |
| High-gluten flour | Wheat flour of the highest grade | |
| Whole grain flour | 1 cup | An incomplete glass of wheat flour of the highest grade |
| Baking powder | 1 tsp. | 1/4 tsp soda plus 1/2 tsp vinegar or lemon juice; 1/4 tsp soda plus 1/2 tsp wine stone; 1/4 tsp soda plus 1/2 tsp sour milk, buttermilk or yogurt |
| Sugar (sand) | 1 cup | A glass of brown sugar; 2 cups powdered sugar; 3/4 cup honey or 14/5 cups of confectionery sugar |
| Sugar burnt (caramel cooler) | 1 cup | A glass of regular sugar plus 2 tbsp dark corn syrup |
| Sugar brown cane | 1 cup | A glass of regular sugar (you can add some dark corn syrup) |
| Sugar lump (refineda ) | 1 cube | 1 tsp sugar |
| Sugar powder | 1 cup | 3/4 cup sugar or a glass of sugar, plus 1 tsp cornstarch – all shredded in a coffee grinder |
| Chocolate unsweetened | 30 г | 3 tbsp cocoa powder plus 1 tbsp butter, confectionery fat, or margarine |
| Chocolate semi-sweet | 30 г | 30 g unsweetened chocolate plus 3 tbsp sugar; 3 tbsp carob plus 2 tbsp water |
Adapted and translated by Wiki Avenue Staff
Sources: Life hacker
