Cooking chocolate

Poet_2

okay, off to get some bicarb then as I want moist American style muffins! cheers

floyd

ha ha sorry, it makes sense to me because I am a biochemist but its basically that baking powder contains a balance of bicarb and cream of tartar so its normally sufficiant to use baking powder alone. In a recipe that contains an extra dry ingredient such as cocoa that does not contain any rising agent and that dries out the mixture the addition of more bicarb ensures it rises properly and doesn't become too tough

Do I pass

Poet_2

p.s. floyd, would you recommend butter or oil?

floyd

I always use veg oil, just because its easier than faffing about with melting stuff

Poet_2

oh, and is it okay to use semi-skilled milk or should i get full fat stuff?

Poet_2

p.p.s I can come round and help you polish off those lemon muffins if you like? hehe

floyd

I use semi skimmed. Aparently they also work well with soya milk. OH has popped home for an hour or so and will probably polish off most of them!!

Poet_2

sorry, another question (am I doing your head in, sorry!) if I want to make choc chips muffins but have the muffin mix minus cocoa powder, how do I do that? I assume I can't just leave out the cocoa powder as that will affect the balance of ingredients won't it?

thriftlady_2

floyd wrote: »

I just copied this from a baking info website:

When a recipe contains baking powder and baking soda, the baking powder does most of the leavening. The baking soda is added to neutralize the acids in the recipe plus to add tenderness and some leavening.

Baking powder is made up of an alkaline ingredient and an acidic ingredient.Together they make bubbles of gas when combined with liquids causing your cake/muffin to rise.

Bicarb is just alkaline. It can only make things rise if it is combined with an acidic ingredient like sour milk or buttermilk (as in soda bread).

Some recipes have ingredients that are acidic but not acidic enough to make the bicarb work -cocoa is an example. They have baking powder added too.

Muffins are a good example of this. I make them with yogurt in. I add some bicarb to a mixture of (acidic) yogurt and oats. I then combine it with flour and baking powder (plus sugar and oil and other stuff like berries or raisins. These come out well risen and very moist.

thriftlady_2

Poet wrote: »

sorry, another question (am I doing your head in, sorry!) if I want to make choc chips muffins but have the muffin mix minus cocoa powder, how do I do that? I assume I can't just leave out the cocoa powder as that will affect the balance of ingredients won't it?

Replace the cocoa with the same weight of flour. If your mix has bicarb in becuase of the acidic cocoa powder (see above post) I'd leave it out