Generally speaking, vegan cooking isn’t that challenging. But one thing that can be a bit tough is vegan baking, as so many of the most fundamental baking ingredients (eggs, milk, butter) are not plant-based. But that, by no means, means that vegan baking is impossible. It just means that you have to learn a few tricks in order to do it successfully. Here are three that will help.
Learn to Replace an Egg
You can easily replace butter and milk with vegan butter and almond or soy milk, but eggs can be a bit trickier to replace. That is, depending on the purpose of the egg in the recipe, you can replace them with applesauce, yogurt, flaxseed, tofu, or even chickpea liquid.
Choose Vegan Recipes
Although eventually you’ll probably get good enough at vegan baking to translate a regular recipe into a vegan one all on your own, when you’re first starting out, it’s a good idea just to use already vegan recipes. That way, you’ll get a sense of what sort of ingredients and techniques are used in vegan baking and you won’t have to do all of that replacement thinking on your own.
Stock Up on the Essentials
There are some ingredients that, while you might not find them in the average pantry, are incredibly useful to have around as a vegan baker. So try to stock up on:
- Canned chickpeas
- Ground flaxseed
- Coconut milk
- Nuts
- Maple syrup
- Date syrup
- Margarine
