Baking and eggs
I was on holiday last week, and enjoyed the chance to do a lot of cooking at home. That got me to thinking about ways of “veganizing” recipes.
Some things are simple. For example, soymilk can replace cow’s milk in almost any recipe. But sometimes you have to be a little more tricky to replace the eggs.
In some cases - oatmeal cookies, for example - you can simply leave out the egg with fine results. I’m convinced that sometimes adding an egg to baked goods is just a habit.
But there is always a risk that in the recipe you choose to omit the egg, it plays a vital role. A sense of humor and spirit of adventure come in handy here. So does a dose of creativity - if those crumbles from the oven can’t really be called cookies, open up a pint of soy ice cream and call them a topping!
And now that it seems you do need an “egg,” you can try some of the many substitures out there. Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s Post Punk Kitchen has great suggestions on vegan baking at http://www.theppk.com/veganbaking.html
The “flax eggs” she describes - 1 tablespoon flax seeds ground and blended with 3 tablespoons water per egg - do work very well. They become very gelatinous and gummy when blended and will surely hold those cookies together. I generally mix up a large batch in the blender. Leftovers will keep a few days in the refrigerator. And they can be divided into ice-cube trays and frozen for long-term storage.
Plain soy flour makes an even simpler egg substitute. One tablespoon of the soy flour and an extra tablespoon or two of water or other liquid can replace one egg in baked goods. You don’t even really need to mix them ahead of time. Just add the soy flour in with the dry ingredients, and the extra liquid in with the wet ingredients.
I have found just one drawback to this method. The raw soy flour can cause an unpleasant taste cookie or cake batter. This taste disappears once the dish is baked, but it cuts down on the joys of eating gobs of raw cookie dough, or licking the mixing spoon.
Readers, have you found any other good ways to replace the eggs in your cooking?
