Tip: If a recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of baking soda you’ll need to use 3 – 4 teaspoons of baking powder. Inaccurately substituting Baking Powder for Baking Sodaīaking soda is about 3 – 4 times stronger than baking powder so these two ingredients are not interchangeable.
Tip: Store these two ingredients at room temperature in a cool, dry place away from heat and moisture, always write the date they were opened on the package, and buy new packages every year. When baking powder is old or expired it will still work but not completely.īaking soda, on the other hand, doesn’t usually have an expiry date on the package and from personal experience, it stays potent for up to 1 year after being opened as long as it’s stored correctly. If this sounds familiar, this is definitely the case for you!Īfter being opened, both baking soda and baking powder become less effective overtime especially when exposed to moisture. Afterwards, they sit in the cabinet or cupboard for a long time collecting dust until the next century when they are needed again. What typically happens is these ingredients are bought for one or two recipes. This usually happens to those who rarely bake or those who rarely ever use leavening ingredients. The oven was set to the wrong temperature or not fully preheated.Using less eggs than the recipe calls for.One or both leavening ingredients were measured incorrectly or mistakenly left out.Inaccurately substituting baking powder for baking soda.Old or expired leavening ingredients (baking soda/baking powder).
Read on to find out what could be the cause and how you can prevent this common muffin issue from happening ever again. Upon activation, carbon dioxide is produced, which allows baked goods to rise and become light and fluffy (1).Flat or sunken muffins? These are reasons why your muffins didn’t rise some are typical baking mistakes and some are not. Baking soda becomes activated when it’s combined with both an acidic ingredient and a liquid. Does baking soda or baking powder make things Fluffy?įormally known as sodium bicarbonate, it’s a white crystalline powder that is naturally alkaline, or basic (1). Combining baking soda with an acid produces a chemical reaction that releases carbon dioxide gas which causes the food to expand and become fluffy. What makes batter fluffy leaven?īaking Soda It’s used to chemically leaven doughs and batters when it is mixed with an acid. You can, however, make a baking powder substitute by using baking soda. If you swap in an equal amount of baking soda for baking powder in your baked goods, they won’t have any lift to them, and your pancakes will be flatter than, well, pancakes. What happens if you use baking soda instead of baking powder in pancakes? When chemical leaveners, such as baking powder, create bubbles in a cooked pancake, the gluten network traps these bubbles and allows a pancake to rise and stay fluffy yet still keep its shape. When the flour is dry, the gluten molecules are nearly immobile, which means that they do not move much.