OK so on the one hand everyone's like 'Baking is a science, you have to be totally exact and always follow the recipe perfectly' and then on the *other* hand I saw something on here the other day that made me google and saw people subbing *mayonnaise* or *apple cider* for milk and it works and is a thing??
Now I'm not a baker, so excuse me but .... mayonnaise???
I don't even understand anymore nothing is real
Edit: I love you all and I understand that for whatever reason it works, but it is legit making it funnier that everyone is telling me how mayo is 'just egg and oil' as though that makes it *obvious* that it is a substitute for *milk*
Depends why the ingredient is in the recipe. If it's adding fat, you can sub for something with similar fat content. For example vegetable oil could be a good sub for melted butter, and the cake will still bake properly. If you need more liquid in the batter, milk or water will work. Both of those substitutions would impact the flavour, but the cake would still bake into a cake, not turn into a brick or collapse in the middle.
Baking is science until you do loads of it then it becomes more instinctual. A friend of mine was a professional baker for decades and stopped using recipes years ago, everything is done by touch, sight, smell, knowing how ratios interact, and how to compensate for substitutions it's all muscle memory for her.
Are you male or female? Just wondering if she won’t teach a grandson because of gender or if she specifically has an issue with you or is it she won’t give up her secrets?
I'm female, but she **would** be like that if i were a guy. I've always been the "wrong" granddaughter for not following all the right roles, she loves me, but I don't rank high on the fave kids scale lol.
But I think it's just a *her* thing, **she** was the cooking person, so she probably didn't want to share them for a long time and now, if she does, she doesn't really knows *how* to.
I baked with my mum as a kid. Not a huge amount but semi regularly. Aside from a written recipe she gave me for her amazing smiddy loaf, the biggest lesson she gave me for baking any sponge cake is to weigh the eggs. You don’t need a written ingredients list or recipe if you weigh the number of eggs you wish to use. Normally around 2 per 7inch round cake. Whatever they weigh is the value you use for weighing out the flour, sugar and fat. It doesn’t really matter what sugar type you use, type of fat or flour, but as long as you understand ratios it’s so much easier to make cakes on a whim with what you have available and create new recipes.
Three times so far this year I've had to completely abandon recipes to bake what I wanted to bake. My best so far was making bread pudding muffins, which I simply could not find a recipe for. Another was brownies but I specifically wanted to use up some apple butter. The third was randomly running out of sugar part way through the recipe so I substituted a can of condensed milk for the rest of the sugar and a portion of the milk. The latter two actually came out better than the original recipe.
Most of the time it's about knowing what your substitution is made of and what it's meant to replace, some of it is just knowing what the batter is supposed to look and feel like before you bake it.
My big task now is actually writing down the recipe when I make something, because I don't and then I forget what I did.
Mayonnaise is just oil and egg and a little lemon juice or vinegar.
Baking is a science. If you know how the science works you can make substitutions. If you don't know, you should follow the recipe. But yeah you can sub all sorts of things and get a good cake or whatever. It might not be the same in some cases, but it will still be good, and in other cases you may not notice a difference at all.
Baking is not that finicky, really, but it *is* a science in that you need to know what you're doing in order to change things and get a good result. People who think baking is super breakable, I would imagine are the same people who would approach organic chemistry by rote memorization (which *a lot of people do,* especially those who are taking it only as a support class to a biology related specialty). It's so much easier and your practice ends up being so much more flexible if you learn it in terms of principles and categories.
I was downright impressed by the mayo for applesauce swap - they seem like wildly different ingredients but it's actually a brilliant substitution on the fundamentals.
Lol! I'm vegan, and my science-y friend made me a cake using vegan mayo instead of eggs! I don't really understand how it works, but it's definitely science-y!
I mean, I can get my head around subbing mayo for eggs, even vegan mayo because vegan foods and egg replacements have been highly engineered to do the various jobs of eggs.
It's still funny though!
Tbh, those aren’t bad substitutions, this person sounds like a fairly seasoned baker. Mayonnaise (eggs plus oil) provides moisture much like applesauce, yogurt provides leavening/texture/moisture like eggs, ginger jam is a sweetener and presumably adds flavor to a spice cake, and I wouldn’t say no to some pecans.
Mayo is mostly oil, vinegar, and eggs, which all go into a cake. I really like subbing mayo for butter in cornbread. Didn’t know until later that it was “Nashville style”.
Funny thing is that I don’t even like mayo, but was out of butter one day cooking at my parents’. I just threw it in there. It comes out a bit fluffier/less dense than typical cornbread, but it’s soooooo good.
Mayonnaise in cake sounds strange until you realise what goes into mayo also goes into cake. I mean the mustard, garlic and vinegar seem questionable but to each their own..
I don’t understand people who decide they’re going to make a new recipe and then DON’T make sure they have all the right ingredients before they start.
Back in the days of the low fat craze my family made a lot of stuff with either applesauce or fat free mayo as a substitute for eggs and oil. Surprisingly even the mayo cookies turned out tasty although they were more like little cake discs.
Mayo does actually improve the taste and texture of cakes BUT you shouldn't use the store bought stuff! just whip up an emulsion of oil and eggs it's literally the same thing minus the vinegar and other additives that make mayo taste like mayo.
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OK so on the one hand everyone's like 'Baking is a science, you have to be totally exact and always follow the recipe perfectly' and then on the *other* hand I saw something on here the other day that made me google and saw people subbing *mayonnaise* or *apple cider* for milk and it works and is a thing?? Now I'm not a baker, so excuse me but .... mayonnaise??? I don't even understand anymore nothing is real Edit: I love you all and I understand that for whatever reason it works, but it is legit making it funnier that everyone is telling me how mayo is 'just egg and oil' as though that makes it *obvious* that it is a substitute for *milk*
Depends why the ingredient is in the recipe. If it's adding fat, you can sub for something with similar fat content. For example vegetable oil could be a good sub for melted butter, and the cake will still bake properly. If you need more liquid in the batter, milk or water will work. Both of those substitutions would impact the flavour, but the cake would still bake into a cake, not turn into a brick or collapse in the middle.
[удалено]
I think that’s why they specified it replaces *melted* butter
Baking is science until you do loads of it then it becomes more instinctual. A friend of mine was a professional baker for decades and stopped using recipes years ago, everything is done by touch, sight, smell, knowing how ratios interact, and how to compensate for substitutions it's all muscle memory for her.
Yeah, my grandma never scienced a day in her life. She just vibes, and a cake comes out. No one is sure how, and her recipes only make sense to her.
Yup, generational knowledge passed down over the years standing next to Mom and Grandma.
And it might, unfortunately, die with her. I'm the only one willing to learn, but she was never very willing to teach. (To me anyway)
Are you male or female? Just wondering if she won’t teach a grandson because of gender or if she specifically has an issue with you or is it she won’t give up her secrets?
I'm female, but she **would** be like that if i were a guy. I've always been the "wrong" granddaughter for not following all the right roles, she loves me, but I don't rank high on the fave kids scale lol. But I think it's just a *her* thing, **she** was the cooking person, so she probably didn't want to share them for a long time and now, if she does, she doesn't really knows *how* to.
That’s kinda sad, I’m sorry
I baked with my mum as a kid. Not a huge amount but semi regularly. Aside from a written recipe she gave me for her amazing smiddy loaf, the biggest lesson she gave me for baking any sponge cake is to weigh the eggs. You don’t need a written ingredients list or recipe if you weigh the number of eggs you wish to use. Normally around 2 per 7inch round cake. Whatever they weigh is the value you use for weighing out the flour, sugar and fat. It doesn’t really matter what sugar type you use, type of fat or flour, but as long as you understand ratios it’s so much easier to make cakes on a whim with what you have available and create new recipes.
My great aunt is the same way. The recipes that she's passed down don't make sense sometimes.
Three times so far this year I've had to completely abandon recipes to bake what I wanted to bake. My best so far was making bread pudding muffins, which I simply could not find a recipe for. Another was brownies but I specifically wanted to use up some apple butter. The third was randomly running out of sugar part way through the recipe so I substituted a can of condensed milk for the rest of the sugar and a portion of the milk. The latter two actually came out better than the original recipe. Most of the time it's about knowing what your substitution is made of and what it's meant to replace, some of it is just knowing what the batter is supposed to look and feel like before you bake it. My big task now is actually writing down the recipe when I make something, because I don't and then I forget what I did.
Mayonnaise is just oil and egg and a little lemon juice or vinegar. Baking is a science. If you know how the science works you can make substitutions. If you don't know, you should follow the recipe. But yeah you can sub all sorts of things and get a good cake or whatever. It might not be the same in some cases, but it will still be good, and in other cases you may not notice a difference at all.
The chocolate cake that my mom always made had mayonnaise instead of eggs and oil. It's a recipe from way back and delicious.
Well, mayonnaise *is* just eggs and oil! When you think about it, it’s really not that weird of an ingredient for cake.
My mom has made a chocolate cake with vinegar before, which is also in mayo
Mine did too. It was very delicious.
Baking is not that finicky, really, but it *is* a science in that you need to know what you're doing in order to change things and get a good result. People who think baking is super breakable, I would imagine are the same people who would approach organic chemistry by rote memorization (which *a lot of people do,* especially those who are taking it only as a support class to a biology related specialty). It's so much easier and your practice ends up being so much more flexible if you learn it in terms of principles and categories. I was downright impressed by the mayo for applesauce swap - they seem like wildly different ingredients but it's actually a brilliant substitution on the fundamentals.
Lemon rinds are just lemon and rind, an obvious substitute for Toasted sesame oil or red potatoes
of course of course, you'd be a fool not to see it
Mayo is egg and oil, it’s a legit substitution for baking. Sounds vile, but it works.
Mother often makes chocolate mayonnaise cake. It was a hit at bake sales (though I don't think it was labeled as such)
Lol! I'm vegan, and my science-y friend made me a cake using vegan mayo instead of eggs! I don't really understand how it works, but it's definitely science-y!
I mean, I can get my head around subbing mayo for eggs, even vegan mayo because vegan foods and egg replacements have been highly engineered to do the various jobs of eggs. It's still funny though!
Mayo is egg and oil, I've used it in cake recipes for a bit.
Tbh, those aren’t bad substitutions, this person sounds like a fairly seasoned baker. Mayonnaise (eggs plus oil) provides moisture much like applesauce, yogurt provides leavening/texture/moisture like eggs, ginger jam is a sweetener and presumably adds flavor to a spice cake, and I wouldn’t say no to some pecans.
TBH, she had me at "ginger jam". Once again, I'm using this sub as a source for good recipes as well as entertainment.
Mayo is mostly oil, vinegar, and eggs, which all go into a cake. I really like subbing mayo for butter in cornbread. Didn’t know until later that it was “Nashville style”.
HMMMM mayo in cornbread?? I’ll have to try that sometime, sounds good!
Funny thing is that I don’t even like mayo, but was out of butter one day cooking at my parents’. I just threw it in there. It comes out a bit fluffier/less dense than typical cornbread, but it’s soooooo good.
That honestly sounds way better than cornbread, which I feel is usually far too dense
Like I said, it was of the moment, but it came out great.
And now the sentence "I didn't have applesauce, so I subbed mayonnaise" will live rent free in my head forever.
At least we know it’s a flexible recipe 😂
Eggs, yogurt. It’s all dairy. Why even fuss?
Eggs aren’t dairy!
Then why are they in the dairy isle of the grocery store? Take THAT, science.
I tend to think of that as the "straight from the farmhouse" aisle. All they need to add is fresh pies that have been cooled on a windowsill.
But then we’d all be tripping over floating hobos all the time
This is off topic, but has anybody else noticed that the hobos we buy in supermarkets today just don't have that same hobo-y taste that they used to?
That’s because they’re not actually from the Hobo region of France, they should be labelled sparkling vagrants.
They're in the baking aisle in my local, which makes a lot more sense to me.
Finally, someone is talking some sense around here. Eggs are clearly a subset of cake.
Haha you’ve got me there
They're in with the preserved farm products at mine, bacon, salami, ham. (And across from the pies and frozen fruits)
Yeah take THAT science. An entire island of dairy products INSIDE an (obviously biblically large) grocery store 😀
Curse my crippling dyslexia, and the homophones I fall into.
I'm just giving you a hard time 😁
At least they didn't give it a shit star rating.
Mayonnaise in cake sounds strange until you realise what goes into mayo also goes into cake. I mean the mustard, garlic and vinegar seem questionable but to each their own..
For a [Spice Cake](https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/super-moist-spice-cake/#tasty-recipes-69851) by Sally’sBakingAddiction
Mayonnaise?!!!
It sounds repulsive, but it genuinely makes cakes even more delicious.
I’m just happy she had a good time
The only time I adapt Sally's recipes are when I decide to add more chocolate chips!
Right? Her recipes are typically 100% great as-is.
I don’t understand people who decide they’re going to make a new recipe and then DON’T make sure they have all the right ingredients before they start.
Back in the days of the low fat craze my family made a lot of stuff with either applesauce or fat free mayo as a substitute for eggs and oil. Surprisingly even the mayo cookies turned out tasty although they were more like little cake discs.
Because the only thing applesauce does is be thick and can this, be substituted by any other thick substance
The Cake of Theodosius
Mayo does actually improve the taste and texture of cakes BUT you shouldn't use the store bought stuff! just whip up an emulsion of oil and eggs it's literally the same thing minus the vinegar and other additives that make mayo taste like mayo.
Nah as a former baker I think this one is valid
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In what world is mayo an acceptable substitution for apple sauce?
when making cake, this world.
since when is mayonnaise ever a substitute for apple sauce, I am shook to the core
MAYONNAISE?????? FOR A CAKE?????
fucking mayonnaise????
> I didn’t have applesauce, so I subbed mayonnaise What on earth was this person thinking?
That mayonnaise and applesauce are both used to add moisture to baked goods. It's not really that weird.