Sodium bicarbonate or simple soda is a safe, completely non-toxic substance that is found in many recipes in cooking.
Soda is familiar to all hostesses as an indispensable ingredient when working with dough. What to do if it was not at hand? How to replace this component in baking? What other products or substances have similar qualities? We will figure out how to replace soda, and whether it will give the desired result.
What is soda for?
In order to understand how soda can be replaced, let’s figure out what role it plays in the test.
Everything is very simple here. Interacting with an acidic environment, soda breaks up into two elements:
Thanks to these components, the dough does not stick together, it becomes fluffy, airy.
Baking soda is the most popular product that saturates the dough with carbon dioxide, but it is not difficult to replace components with similar properties. What are these components? Tell you.
Soda and its food analogues
Can soda be replaced? Yes! As the reader already understood, not only she is able to give the test splendor and real airiness.
Culinary experts advise replacing soda with dry or live yeast, which can be easily purchased at any store.
Also quite often, alcohol can act as a similar component - this is rum, simple beer, cognac and even alcohol.
What else to replace with baking soda? Foreign hostesses recommend using ammonia in the process of culinary creativity, but, of course, only food.
But it must be remembered that the lack of soda can not always be compensated for by adding yeast. Most often, yeast is used to prepare delicious pastries from yeast dough, but this component is not suitable for biscuit.
Ammonium carbonate
This substance, decomposing at high temperature, is capable of emitting carbon dioxide, as well as ammonia, so this product is used in baking large volumes.
In the process of cooking with such a component, you have to behave very carefully, observe all proportions accurately, and at home, in a hurry, when everything is done “by eye”, it is not always easy to maintain all the ratios.
Therefore, use this ingredient in baking, if you are a true professional in your field, otherwise you risk spoiling all the products.
Baking powder as a substitute for sodium bicarbonate
How can I replace baking soda? Of course, baking powder. It is also called baking powder. What he really is? This is a product containing additives such as:
- Soda.
- Lemon acid.
- Starch, flour is also possible.
This component is ideal for dough. Its convenience lies in the fact that if at hand there are no sour-milk products, for example, sour cream, kefir, whey, yogurt or even yogurt, it will still loosen and fluff the mass.
The dose of baking powder added to the dough instead of the usual product, usually exceeds it twice. For example, ten grams of baking powder per pound of flour. Soda would have to add five grams.
But one piece of advice: always sift the flour, otherwise the dough may not rise, it will not work to prepare butter baking.
Margarine or butter - soda substitute
Do you want to get luxurious pancakes or delicate pancakes, but there was no soda at hand? Do not worry, ordinary margarine or butter will come to the rescue.
They will give the dough softness, airiness, make it porous and incredibly tasty. Here it is necessary to remember that you need to add this fatty product in larger doses than indicated in the recipe. Do not spare the margarine or butter, then the result of the work will please with its taste.
Alcohol
What else can replace soda? As already mentioned a little above, almost any strong alcohol-containing drink is able to replace it. Soda is over - we go to our minibar and get a bottle of vodka or cognac. Wine, absinthe and martini are no helpers in these culinary affairs.
So, one tablespoon of strong alcohol corresponds to 2.5 grams of sodium bicarbonate. No vodka, take alcohol, beer, aromatic liquor (then the dough will be fragrant) or rum.
Mineral water
If the proposed components were not at hand, there is no beer, no butter with margarine, no baking powder, use a mineral water, preferably highly carbonated.
A simple sponge cake will become taller and more magnificent, and the pies are simply incredibly airy, if you use this simple component.
Sour-milk substitutes for soda
What else can replace soda? When at hand there is kefir or yogurt, or just sour milk, then its absence will not be so critical.
The fermented product will give baking elasticity, but it will need to be slightly warmed up so that fermentation goes actively.
On yogurt and milk very delicious pancakes are obtained, and no soda is needed here.
So, if you still decide to replace sodium bicarbonate, which according to the recipe is a necessary component, always be prepared for the fact that the baking result will not please. This is not a fact, but, nevertheless, the dough is a capricious thing, and how it will behave when replacing soda with a substitute is not clear. Perhaps the obtained buns will exceed all possible expectations. But, for example, if the recipe for the test contains such components as chocolate, fruit or juice from them, marmalade, honey, then soda is irreplaceable here, and even yeast will not help to make a biscuit tasty.
Therefore, before you start preparing the next culinary delight, make sure that all the ingredients are at hand, and soda is no exception. Bon Appetit.