All the Ways Chickpea Liquid Can Replace Eggs in Dessert Recipes
While I’ve known about the aquafaba (chickpea pickle liquid) hack for a while, I always thought of it more for people with food allergies. Why would I, a happy egg lover, ever use them instead of eggs? Well, here we are. Egg prices don’t look like they’re going down anytime soon, and if you’re as egg dependent as I am, you might be looking for ways to cut costs. While I will still spend money on real canned scrambled eggs , I will use aquafaba for other egg-related recipes.
The chickpea liquid gets its magical binding properties from the starches that are leached from the beans and released into the brine. When cooked, the water evaporates, leaving starches, salt and traces of other ingredients bound together in a sticky web. I boiled some chickpea liquid in a saucepan to see.
Is this an egg? Definitely not. While a thin sheet of cooked, lightly browned starch doesn’t look as impressive, it really shows us what this simple liquid can do. However, note that the salt in jars of chickpea liquid varies significantly. When using in baking, taste the aquafaba, and if it is very salty, reduce the amount of salt in the recipe by a quarter teaspoon per two “eggs” in the recipe.
Use aquafaba in batters
Binding is a big reason why eggs are used in cookie and cake batters, and fortunately, aquafaba can work this way. What aquafaba doesn’t naturally do that eggs do is make it flaky. Even if you don’t beat the egg, it still has some consistency after it’s cooked. Chickpea liquid by nature does not have the same consistency, but this problem can be solved. Aquafaba whips up quite easily and manages to retain aeration. (More on this in a bit)
For batters that don’t need a lot of flaky layers in baked goods, such as brownies, you can pour the aquafaba directly into the batter. For one whole large egg, take three tablespoons of aquafaba. Use two tablespoons of aquafaba per egg white.
For batters and batters that you would like to rise a little, whisk together the required amount of aquafaba in a small bowl. Just whisk it until it becomes soft and foamy; no hard peaks are needed for this use. Then mix it into the batter as usual at the egg adding step. This slight aeration will give your cookies a mounded shape and give your regular cake batter a little rise. While this may be an annoying extra five to ten minutes of your time, it’s worth it.
Use aquafaba for meringues
A typical meringue has just two main ingredients: egg whites and sugar. And honestly, it’s just meringue because the egg whites do all the hard work. Still, aquafaba can help with this. Again, I’ve never relied heavily on this bean syrup, but it has never let me down when I whipped it up.
Egg or otherwise, no meringue will last long unless you stabilize it in some way. Always whisk the aquafaba with a little cream of tartar so you have more time to work with the whipped meringue. For every cup of aquafaba, use half a teaspoon of cream of tartar to stabilize the texture. Beat both parts together until the mixture becomes foamy on top, about three to five minutes, then add the sugar and beat until the mixture reaches stiff peaks. Use this meringue to make meringue cookies, pavlovas, or add it to other doughs for maximum rise.
Use aquafaba to wash eggs.
Washing eggs is one of the easiest ways to bake. Adding egg liquid will help hold cakes and baked goods together so they don’t explode, and will also add color and shine to the outside of bread and a variety of other treats. Although sour cream washes the outside of the eggs well, it does little to bind. However, Aquafaba is here to help. Simply brush the liquid onto the dough or bread as you would with eggs and start cooking. You won’t notice any off-flavors, but you may feel a tickle from the salt.