Deep thoughts on egg replacer...

Because I've had questions on the subject, here are a few scattered thoughts about egg replacer. You may have noticed that I use it in most of my cookies. I know I've mentioned it before, but thought it was worth doing a single entry on the subject.

For a while I experimented with being vegan. It was interesting, from a culinary perspective, to be forced to cook without any animal products. And it turned out to be very valuable, since one of my relatives developed a severe allergy to milk; I've learned many tricks and substitutions that come in very handy.

Since I'm no longer vegan, why do I bother with the egg replacer? There are several reasons reasons:

1. Ener-G egg replacer (the kind I use) is cheaper than eggs. Pretty self-explanatory, really. I'm a grad student, therefore I'm poor.

2. Ener-G can be kept indefinitely in a cupboard. It takes up very little space, and does not go off. So no checking of expiration dates, etc. is ever required.

3. To the best of my knowledge, egg replacer has never been linked to salmonella or any other food-borne pathogen. So I can eat cookie dough (which I generally prefer to cookies) without any worry about food poisoning.

4. To use Ener-G egg replacer, you add 1.5 tsp powdered egg replacer and 2 tbsp water... but I've learned that "water" can be interpreted as "any liquid I like." So by using egg replacer I suddenly have the ability to add different liquids without screwing up the liquid/dry ingredient ratio. This comes in very handy for things like rum cookies, the recipe for which I will post one of these days. I've also, as I've mentioned before, often used flavored coffee creamer in place of the water as a way of changing the flavor of cookies without having to invest in a ton of different extracts. Cheap, convenient, tasty.

5. Health. No eggs in a recipe = lower saturated fat, cholesterol, etc. Plus some people are allergic to eggs, so it's nice to be able to offer them something they can eat.

When do I not use egg replacer?

1. Anytime eggs are a structurally essential part of what I'm cooking (cream puffs/eclairs, for example, to say nothing of angel food cake and the like). I know that the Ener-G people would like us to believe that it will always work as a substitute, but it's simply not true.

2. Brownies. I don't know why, but it never works for me.

3. For most cakes I use at most 50/50 egg replacer/egg. Many cakes need the extra richness provided by eggs, so I don't like to totally swap out the eggs unless I am really sure it's going to work.

4. Any really rich dessert (chocolate torte, cheesecake, etc). Again, the dessert often requires the richness of the eggs to really work.

As a good rule of thumb with a new recipe, try a 50/50 swap, then go from there. If it totally fails, the recipe is probably not amenable to egg replacement. If it works justs fine, you can probably try a total replacement, preferably not when you're pressed for time (so if it fails you won't freak out).

So those are my thoughts... I recommend giving egg replacer a go for those who bake a lot. It's convenient, cheap and easy to use.

Almond Cookies

Many apologies for the delay in posting, as usual someone requested the recipe a while ago, but I haven't had time to actually write it down. Now that Tae Kwon Do winter camp is over (exhibit A in the "Things I Do to Support My Eating Habit" display), however, I can actually get back to being a semi-normal human being.

Or so I hope.

Anyway, here is the newest and greatest in the Sam Recipe File. For fellow Hydes, I'll comment that the almondness of these cookies always reminds me of the Spritz cookies we make every Christmas, but without the suspicious green food colouring. For everyone else, I'll just say that this is a d*@! fine cookie recipe.

The inspiration:



Now I live in a poor benighted state that does not have a single (I know this is shocking) Trader Joe's store anywhere within the state boundaries. The nearest TJs is about four hours away in Massachusetts. One of the things I really enjoy from TJ is their very tasty chocolate almonds, so when I saw that Costco was selling them I was a pretty happy bunny. Unfortunately, Costco's almonds aren't as good as TJ chocolate almonds, but they are pretty tasty nonetheless, and there were an awful lot of them. I quickly realized I probably could (but definitely should not) eat the whole lot by myself. So I decided to cookify them...you know, for health reasons. (This made sense at the time. Really.)

Step 1:

Pulverize the heck out of the almonds. I used a blender for this. A food processor would also work. The only thing to watch out for is that you don't want to make almond butter here, so short quick pulses are better than turning the blender on and walking out of the room. You want small but not necessarily uniform pieces.




Step 2:

Make the cookie dough.

Blend well:

1/2 Cup (one stick) butter
2/3 Cup sugar (light brown sugar also works, or a mix of the two.)

Once this is completely blended together, add:

1 egg (or 1 egg worth of egg replacer, which is what I use).

Mix until completely blended together. Then add 1.5 teaspoons almond extract (anywhere between 1 and 2 is fine, I've settled on 1.5 as a happy medium, having tried 1, 1.5 and 2).

In separate bowl, combine:

1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/3 Cup all-purpose flour

Add flour mixture to butter/sugar mixture, mix until incorporated (but stop mixing once this occurs, you don't want to overmix it). Then add whatever chopped up almonds you haven't snitched. Roll the cookies into balls, stick on a sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes at 350F. You may need to add a tablespoon or two of flour if the cookie dough is sticky. If you're unsure, bake just one or two cookies. If they spread out too much, add a little more flour to the rest of the dough before baking.

Cookie dough before baking:




Cookies after I got all ambitious in a Martha Stewartesque fashion and added a chocolate almond to the top of each cookie before baking them:



As you can see, the cookies should look just barely done when you pull them out of the oven. Leave them to cool on the pan for about five minutes, then loosen with a spatula.

As a side note: it works really well if you roll the cookies out, stick them on a pan and freeze the dough. Once the dough is frozen you can stick it in a tupperware in your freezer and just pull it out whenever you need cookies in a hurry. This will add 2-5 minutes to your baking time, but otherwise nothing changes.