Top 10 ingredient swaps
Get food savvy with our list of top ten ingredients and our favourite alternatives.
If you have time, it’s a great opportunity to cook some delicious dishes. It can, however, be a bit frustrating if you have decided on a certain recipe and you haven’t got all the ingredients. That’s why we’ve been getting creative with how we use the ingredients we have to hand. And dare we say it, they might just be better than the originals. We’ll let you be the judge. Here is our list of some of our favourite alternatives.
1. Eggs
Need a little something sweet? You can use a half banana for every egg in your cake recipes (these also work for pancakes too). Try Stine, our resident vegan baker’s tasty banana bread. The softer the banana the better in this case. No bananas, no bother. Try making a chia or flaxseed egg, 1 tablespoon of seeds to 2.5 tablespoons of water = an egg. Then use as a substitute in a range of delicious recipes such as sweetcorn fritters.
2. Rice
Run out of rice? Cous-cous is a great alternative and grains and pulses like bulgur, freekeh, buckwheat, spelt and barley are all tasty and can be served in place of rice. One ingredient cauliflower rice will provide a delicious accompaniment for any dish that calls for rice. If you can’t get enough cauliflower in your life, try pairing it up with our cauliflower and chickpea curry.
3. Garlic
Garlic’s gone? Use an eighth of a teaspoon of garlic powder for every garlic clove in the recipe, but make sure you add it later in the recipe. Powdered garlic will burn much more quickly than fresh.
4. Onions
Do you have everything you need for that delicious dinner except an onion? Don’t worry you can use shallots, leeks or spring onions as alternatives. Still coming up short? Try a pinch of onion powder or some chopped fresh chives (or even dried).
5. Pasta
No pasta, no problem. Try healthy vegetable pasta as an alternative. Make tagliatelle by using a vegetable peeler to take long strips of parsnips, carrots, broccoli stalks or courgettes to use in place of the spaghetti. Just boil for a minute for a delicious al-dente alternative. Pair it up with one of our five pasta recipes using roughly five ingredients.
6. Herbs and Spices
Different herbs and spices have different flavour properties. Some are earthy, some are zesty, some are warming etc. When considering making a substitution for a herb or spice that you don’t have, try and think about these flavour properties and make an educated match. These are our top three swaps:
Cinnamon, nutmeg and mace are aromatic warming spices, try using them in sweet or middle eastern dishes.
Coriander and lemon grass are citrusy, so if you don’t have one of these try adding a squeeze of lemon at the end of cooking.
Basil, marjoram, thyme and oregano are all sweet and pungent and often used in Italian, Greek and Spanish cooking. If you are missing one try using another to see how it changes your dish.
7. Flour
Sweet or savoury? Bread or cake? Flour is a kitchen staple that is used across a range of dishes. But there are alternatives…
To make a moreish cake you could use ground polenta or ground almonds. Why not try this sticky lemon and rosemary polenta cake.
Making bread without any flour is tricky but there are alternatives to wheat flour. If you already have stale bread you could revive it with our steamed bread pudding. If you have no wheat flour, but have ground spelt, buckwheat or chickpea embrace variety and use them as an alternative.
Flour is brilliant for thickening sauces and soups, but so are breadcrumbs. Try our Tuscan ribollita soup recipe which is made of stale bread and a mixture of vegetables. You can also use an egg yolk to thicken a sauce at the end of cooking.
8. Yeast
We often use yeast to make leavened bread (the type that rises). But we have made bread without yeast for years.To make leavened bread without store bought yeast you have two options. One, if you you’re happy to wait, you can harness yeast by creating your own sourdough starter. Or use baking powder as we have done in this traditional Irish soda bread with fennel seeds. Then, there is always unleavened bread, such as these Sri Lankan coconut rotis.
9. Tomatoes
Tomatoes are a hero ingredient in a lot of recipes, but you can use tomato puree and a bit of stock to add flavour to dishes such as three bean Mexican chilli instead of the suggested tinned tomatoes.You can roast red peppers or butternut squash and then blitz to get a puree. This can then be added as a substitute to dishes from curries to pasta sauces to add the sweetness that tinned tomatoes often offer.
10. Stock cubes
Planning to create a delicious soup, sauce or stew? But, can't find that stock cube you thought was lurking in the cupboard. Try our delicious zero waste vegetable stock recipe, it's quicker and easier than you might think.
Forgot to batch cook?
Try our 10 easy lunch recipes for those times you haven’t got anything pre-prepared!