Our camera does not want to connect to our computer. This makes me crazy, especially since the camera is brand spanking new. I've been baking like a mad woman for the past several days and taking pictures of my egg-free trials in the kitchen, and finally when I have a spare moment to upload some recipes, I can't get the pictures off the camera! Grrrr.
And on the subject of taking pictures of food, Anna has caught on to how weird that is...I feel like a freak when I do it, but I can't help myself. One day not long ago I was taking a picture of something that just came out of the oven and Anna came sauntering over to investigate. She looked at the cookies, looked at the camera, looked at me and said "Mommy, you are always taking pictures of food!". She may as well have looked at me like I had two alien googly eyes sprouting out the top of my head. Although I have to admit, I was secretly pleased that she used such an on-topic, fully constructed, grammatically correct sentence.
Now about those egg free cupcakes. I had posted a list of egg free substitutes a month ago, even though I do not (yet) bake without eggs. So when a mom in distress asked for help obtaining some gluten free, casein free, soy free and egg free cupcakes for her son's birthday party, I put my money where my mouth was and offered to help. Really, this was a very silly thing to do since I had only two days to figure this out and I was not sure it was going to work. But I do love a challenge and have always gotten a thrill out of flying by the seat of my pants. And really, there is no better way to learn how to do something than when there's a deadline breathing down the back of your neck.
So I got on the phone with my BFF to ask for her advice, because she bakes gluten and egg free and she had just made a cake that she said turned out pretty good. Julie said the substitute she used was 2 tbsp. water + 1 tbsp. canola oil + 2 tsp. baking powder...mix it up till it starts frothing and add it to the creamed sugar mixture that way. So that's what I did. I'm sorry to say that pride goes before a fall. Ten minutes into baking I turned on the oven light to see how the cupcakes were faring and I observed with horror that they were exploding all over the oven. No seriously, they were exploding. The cupcakes had risen to the top of the muffin tin but they were full of dozens of little air bubbles that popped vigorously like little geysers. Each geyser that blew up had the exact same effect as opening the oven door and slamming it shut. Eventually there was batter running over the sides of the muffin tin onto the floor of the oven and huge craters developed in the middle of each little volcano of a cupcake. Aw crumb, I thought. There was too much leavening.
So I tried again using less leavening in the next egg sub, which was 1 tbsp. tapioca starch + 2 tbsp. water + 2 tsp. canola oil + 1/2 tsp. baking powder. The same thing happened - little popping geysers - but instead of exploding this time they imploded and left big craters in the cupcakes while sparing the oven floor. Still too much leavening.
I tried that one again without the leavening. Still the same thing happened, but not as bad. Now I was starting to panic. I tried again using 1 tbsp. ground flaxseed meal + 3 tbsp. warm water. The flax seed should help hold things together, plus add a little weight to the batter, if you will. These cupcakes did not have exploding little geysers, but after rising they still cratered. Rats. There was no extra leavening to blame and I eyed starch as the culprit. There was too much starch flour in my flour mix. I'm not sure why this would make a difference in egg free baking, but it does. So I got online to see who else was baking gluten and egg free and found a muffin recipe here at Gluten Free Goddess that looked a lot like the recipe I was using, but it had scaled way back on the starch flour. Aha. I'm not good at math, but I guesstimated that the starch flour was a little less than 1/4 the ratio of the other flours in her recipe, where in mine it half.
I tried again measuring out my flours for the recipe instead of using a pre-made flour blend and kept the starch flour to a 1/4 ratio. I used the flax seed substitute again. This time, the cupcakes came out with cute wee bellybuttons instead of yawning craters. I switched from using palm shortening to canola oil and tried again and this time, it worked. The cupcakes had just a hint of a dimple in their middles which could be masked with frosting. I broke one open and inside, the crumb was beautiful - not soggy, not dense, not gummy. And they tasted amazing. I'm not lying to you. The girls ate them without the frosting, not even blinking slightly to suggest they noticed anything different about these cupcakes than any others I've made in the past. In fact, they would have eaten them hand over fist if I had let them. When my husband came home and I foisted on one him and he was not lying to me when he said they were awesome. Then he had another one. Later that night I woke up hungry at about 4:30am - I hate it when that happens, but I had not eaten a good dinner because I was busy baking. There was nothing easy to grab except the cupcakes so I grabbed one of those and even through my sleep-fogged brain I thought "gosh darn it, these taste good" as I stumbled back to bed.
Success. I made two different cupcake recipes (here and here) that turned out great. The mom in distress loved them. The birthday boy loved them. And I floated on an egg-free high for two days, VERY happy I had made it work. Phew! Egg free baking is not so bad, after all (fingers crossed behind back).
~~~~~~~~~~~
I realize I could have tried using Ener-G Egg Replacer in my recipes. But not only is it expensive, it's simple enough to make at home (basically it's just tapioca starch, potato starch and leavening). And I want to be empowered in the kitchen. I want to use the simple ingredients I have kicking around in the cabinets, not a specialty item that becomes a crutch so when I can't get any I panic that it's not there. And I had just posted a list of egg free substitutes to make at home that I felt I should try first. So that's why I didn't use it in my egg free trials. I may go buy some eventually to test it against other egg free substitutes, but only out of interest, not because I have to. Instead I bought Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which includes two great looking gluten free recipes and which will be a better investment in the long run!
And on the subject of taking pictures of food, Anna has caught on to how weird that is...I feel like a freak when I do it, but I can't help myself. One day not long ago I was taking a picture of something that just came out of the oven and Anna came sauntering over to investigate. She looked at the cookies, looked at the camera, looked at me and said "Mommy, you are always taking pictures of food!". She may as well have looked at me like I had two alien googly eyes sprouting out the top of my head. Although I have to admit, I was secretly pleased that she used such an on-topic, fully constructed, grammatically correct sentence.
Now about those egg free cupcakes. I had posted a list of egg free substitutes a month ago, even though I do not (yet) bake without eggs. So when a mom in distress asked for help obtaining some gluten free, casein free, soy free and egg free cupcakes for her son's birthday party, I put my money where my mouth was and offered to help. Really, this was a very silly thing to do since I had only two days to figure this out and I was not sure it was going to work. But I do love a challenge and have always gotten a thrill out of flying by the seat of my pants. And really, there is no better way to learn how to do something than when there's a deadline breathing down the back of your neck.
So I got on the phone with my BFF to ask for her advice, because she bakes gluten and egg free and she had just made a cake that she said turned out pretty good. Julie said the substitute she used was 2 tbsp. water + 1 tbsp. canola oil + 2 tsp. baking powder...mix it up till it starts frothing and add it to the creamed sugar mixture that way. So that's what I did. I'm sorry to say that pride goes before a fall. Ten minutes into baking I turned on the oven light to see how the cupcakes were faring and I observed with horror that they were exploding all over the oven. No seriously, they were exploding. The cupcakes had risen to the top of the muffin tin but they were full of dozens of little air bubbles that popped vigorously like little geysers. Each geyser that blew up had the exact same effect as opening the oven door and slamming it shut. Eventually there was batter running over the sides of the muffin tin onto the floor of the oven and huge craters developed in the middle of each little volcano of a cupcake. Aw crumb, I thought. There was too much leavening.
So I tried again using less leavening in the next egg sub, which was 1 tbsp. tapioca starch + 2 tbsp. water + 2 tsp. canola oil + 1/2 tsp. baking powder. The same thing happened - little popping geysers - but instead of exploding this time they imploded and left big craters in the cupcakes while sparing the oven floor. Still too much leavening.
I tried that one again without the leavening. Still the same thing happened, but not as bad. Now I was starting to panic. I tried again using 1 tbsp. ground flaxseed meal + 3 tbsp. warm water. The flax seed should help hold things together, plus add a little weight to the batter, if you will. These cupcakes did not have exploding little geysers, but after rising they still cratered. Rats. There was no extra leavening to blame and I eyed starch as the culprit. There was too much starch flour in my flour mix. I'm not sure why this would make a difference in egg free baking, but it does. So I got online to see who else was baking gluten and egg free and found a muffin recipe here at Gluten Free Goddess that looked a lot like the recipe I was using, but it had scaled way back on the starch flour. Aha. I'm not good at math, but I guesstimated that the starch flour was a little less than 1/4 the ratio of the other flours in her recipe, where in mine it half.
I tried again measuring out my flours for the recipe instead of using a pre-made flour blend and kept the starch flour to a 1/4 ratio. I used the flax seed substitute again. This time, the cupcakes came out with cute wee bellybuttons instead of yawning craters. I switched from using palm shortening to canola oil and tried again and this time, it worked. The cupcakes had just a hint of a dimple in their middles which could be masked with frosting. I broke one open and inside, the crumb was beautiful - not soggy, not dense, not gummy. And they tasted amazing. I'm not lying to you. The girls ate them without the frosting, not even blinking slightly to suggest they noticed anything different about these cupcakes than any others I've made in the past. In fact, they would have eaten them hand over fist if I had let them. When my husband came home and I foisted on one him and he was not lying to me when he said they were awesome. Then he had another one. Later that night I woke up hungry at about 4:30am - I hate it when that happens, but I had not eaten a good dinner because I was busy baking. There was nothing easy to grab except the cupcakes so I grabbed one of those and even through my sleep-fogged brain I thought "gosh darn it, these taste good" as I stumbled back to bed.
Success. I made two different cupcake recipes (here and here) that turned out great. The mom in distress loved them. The birthday boy loved them. And I floated on an egg-free high for two days, VERY happy I had made it work. Phew! Egg free baking is not so bad, after all (fingers crossed behind back).
~~~~~~~~~~~
I realize I could have tried using Ener-G Egg Replacer in my recipes. But not only is it expensive, it's simple enough to make at home (basically it's just tapioca starch, potato starch and leavening). And I want to be empowered in the kitchen. I want to use the simple ingredients I have kicking around in the cabinets, not a specialty item that becomes a crutch so when I can't get any I panic that it's not there. And I had just posted a list of egg free substitutes to make at home that I felt I should try first. So that's why I didn't use it in my egg free trials. I may go buy some eventually to test it against other egg free substitutes, but only out of interest, not because I have to. Instead I bought Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which includes two great looking gluten free recipes and which will be a better investment in the long run!
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