BabyCakes NYC Owner Erin McKenna Talks Vegan Cupcakes
Posted on October 17, 2011
Vegan baking has come a long way. Once the butt of jokes, vegan desserts are much more accepted by the mainstream. BabyCakes NYC owner Erin McKenna showed some of the tricks of the trade to the Wall Street Journal.
It's not easy making a tasty cupcake or cookie without using butter or eggs, but Erin has a lot of happy customers (Anthony Bourdain is probably not one of them). Erin says it's all a matter of coming up with the right substitutions.
For her red velvet cupcakes, she substitutes a mixture of soy milk and apple cider vinegar for buttermilk. Butter is replaced with coconut oil which has a similar melting point to butter.
Eggs are more difficult to replace. Erin uses flaxmeal mixed with water to replace eggs. Katy McLaughlin reports: