No Eggs? Here's How To Make A Replacement With Just 2 Ingredients

Eggs are such a basic baking ingredient that they almost seem indispensable, and yet there are egg substitutes galore. These include a plethora of commercially available plant-based ones (we did a vegan "egg" review so you don't have to), as well as others like applesauce, aquafaba (canned bean juice), mashed banana, and yogurt. Well, here's another one to add to the list: flax seeds. When added to water, these create a kind of jelly-like goo that serves the same binding purpose as an egg.

To make flax eggs, you need flaxseed meal, which can be purchased ready-made. If you have whole flax seeds instead, you can make your own meal by grinding these for about 30 seconds in a spice or coffee grinder or blender. For each flax egg, you'll need one tablespoon of meal (or one and a half teaspoons whole flax seeds, which will yield a tablespoon of meal when ground). This is then mixed with two and a half tablespoons of room temperature water and allowed to sit for about 10 minutes or so, until it gels. The result is the equivalent of one large egg, which is the standard size used in most baking recipes.

Now, clearly you're not going to use flax eggs in a recipe where eggs are at the forefront — fried flax blobs with bacon do not a tasty breakfast make. While plant-based boiled eggs do exist, these are made from almonds, cashews, and coconut milk, not flax. Flax eggs, like most egg substitutes, are meant more as a baking ingredient. Even then, though, they're not suited to every recipe. They don't bind or stiffen quite as well as real eggs, nor do they allow the batter to rise to the same degree. For that reason, they may not work as well as, say, aquafaba, in something like a soufflé or meringue.

Flax eggs, however, are just fine for most standard cookie recipes, and they're also good for brownies, muffins, quick breads, pancakes, waffles, and sturdier types of cakes (think pound as opposed to sponge). Other uses for them include binding meatballs or meatloaf, or as part of the process for breading something like fried chicken (or a vegan substitute) when egg is used to get the crumb coating to adhere to the surface. With prices still on the rise, it's good have easy egg substitutes for baking in your repertoire.