Rant: My vegan cookie disaster taught me about ingredient swaps

I tried baking vegan cookies for my roommate's new diet. Swapped butter for coconut oil without adjusting the recipe. They came out flat and greasy, a total fail. But it showed me how small changes can ruin a bake. I'm gonna research proper substitutes before my next attempt.

4 comments

4 Comments

lucasw573mo ago

Coconut oil melts faster, that's why, @mark_ward.

hayden_craig952mo ago

Hot take: Swaps need science. But seriously, how many of us have just swapped stuff without really knowing why the original ingredient was there? Butter isn't just fat, it has water and milk solids that do stuff in baking. Coconut oil is just fat. That's a huge deal for how cookies spread and set. Mark's right that soft butter can cause spread too, but changing the whole fat profile is a bigger gamble. You gotta look up what each part does before you change it, or you're just hoping for the best.

mark_ward3mo ago

Sometimes a bad batch is just a bad batch, you know? Regular cookies can spread too thin if your butter was too soft. Maybe it's not always about the swap being wrong. I've seen coconut oil work fine in other recipes, so maybe the problem was something else?

west.casey3mo ago

But doesn't coconut oil melt at a lower temp than butter? I've found that even with firm butter, the swap can change how cookies spread. What do you think?