How to substitute ingredients

Ask what the ingredient is doing

Every ingredient in a recipe has a job, and often more than one. Before substituting, work out which job matters here.

Flavour substitutes freely. One herb for another, one vinegar for another, one chilli for another — the dish changes character and it still works.

Structure does not. Eggs holding a cake together, gluten holding bread up, gelatine setting a jelly, sugar making a meringue: these are doing physical work and there is no casual swap.

Fat, acid, salt and liquid are somewhere in between. They can usually be swapped within their category with adjustments — butter for oil changes texture; lemon for vinegar changes flavour; stock for water changes depth.

The rule: the more a recipe depends on the ingredient behaving in a particular way, the less substitutable it is.

Swaps that work

Buttermilk

Milk with a tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar per 250ml, left ten minutes. Or thin plain yoghurt with milk. Works because what the recipe wants is acidity plus dairy.

Self-raising flour

Plain flour plus about 2 teaspoons of baking powder per 150g, sifted together.

Soured cream

Full-fat Greek yoghurt, or crème fraîche — the latter is more heat-stable.

One vinegar for another

Freely, adjusting for strength. Rice vinegar is much milder than distilled.

One neutral oil for another

Freely.

Shallot for onion

Yes, and vice versa. Shallots are milder and sweeter.

Stock for water

Always an improvement, adjusting the salt.

Fresh herbs for dried

Roughly three to one by volume, and only for hardy herbs. Dried basil, parsley and coriander are not substitutes for fresh.

Swaps that change the dish

Butter for oil in baking

Changes texture substantially. Oil gives a moister, softer cake; butter gives flavour and, when creamed, aeration. Not interchangeable in a creamed sponge.

Honey for sugar

Sweeter, wetter, more acidic, browns faster. Use about three-quarters the weight, cut other liquid, drop the oven temperature.

Bicarbonate of soda for baking powder

Not interchangeable. Bicarbonate needs an acid present; baking powder contains its own. Roughly a quarter as much bicarbonate as powder, and only with acid in the recipe.

Plain flour for strong flour in bread

Works, and gives a softer, less chewy, less well-risen loaf.

Dutch cocoa for natural cocoa

Changes the acidity, so a cake relying on bicarbonate will not rise.

Smoked paprika for sweet

Takes over the dish entirely.

Lime for lemon

Sharper, more floral-bitter, dominant. A real flavour change.

Substitutions that mostly do not work

• Eggs in a cake or a custard. Commercial replacers work in some bakes and nothing replicates what eggs do in a custard, a meringue or a mayonnaise.
• Gluten-free flour, one-for-one, in bread. Gluten is doing structural work with no direct replacement; gluten-free bread is a different recipe with binders in it.
• Cornflour for flour in a roux. Different thickening behaviour, different appearance, and it will not hold.
• Low-fat dairy where fat matters. Low-fat cream will not whip; low-fat yoghurt splits far more readily.
• Sugar substitutes in anything structural — meringue, jam, caramel, ice cream. Sugar is doing physical work.
• Reducing the sugar in a cake by half and expecting the same cake. It is a texture ingredient as much as a sweet one.

Common questions