Brownies are either square or rectangularly baked confection made of flour, butter, eggs, sugar and chocolate or cocoa powder. There are instances where some are have egg allergy, cannot tolerate eating eggs or there are no eggs available in the kitchen and since eggs is one of the main ingredients to make brownies, is it possible to make brownies without eggs? Yes! You can still make brownies even without eggs. In this post, we will show you different egg substitutes that you can use when making your homemade brownies with the quick and easy brownie recipes below.
Make Brownies Without Eggs
Eggs is an important ingredient in making traditional brownies as well as the boxed brownies. Aside from adding structure to the brownies, eggs helps all the other ingredients to bind together. If you notice brownies that uses eggs are moist and fudgy as compared to brownies without eggs. If a brownie recipe does not contain any eggs or egg substitute, it will usually result to a dry and crumbled brownie.
If eggs are not available, there other different options of egg alternatives. When making brownies without eggs, we have to make some necessary adjustments to the ingredients and at the same time use egg substitutes instead.
Egg Substitutes
You can use egg substitutes when making eggless brownies and there are a number of them to choose from that includes Fruit purees such as mashed banana or unsweetened applesauce, flaxseed or chia seeds that were soaked in water, yogurt or sour cream and there are those commercial made egg replaces that you can easily purchase at your local grocery store.
The egg substitutes mentioned when used in making brownies also works well in making your brownies moist and still delicious.
If you will be using yogurt or fruit puree as an egg substitute for your egg free brownie recipe, make sure to make necessary adjustments to your ingredient especially the amount of sugar you use.
Fruit Purees
Pureed fruits such as unsweetened apple sauce and mashed bananas are great choice when replacing eggs. Although the texture of the brownie will be different, its flavor will still be the same.
Other pureed fruits for use as egg substitute includes softened dates, pureed prunes and plumped raisins.
When using fruit purees in making egg free brownies at home, baking the brownies will usually takes longer than usual.
Yogurt/ Sour Cream
When using sour cream or yogurt as egg substitute for your brownie mix, it will still result to a delicious brownies and the texture will still be the same the brownie mix that uses eggs. The richness and moisture of your brownies is the same as the traditional brownie recipes.
Make sure to use full fat yogurt or sour cream.
Flaxseed or Chia seeds
Who would have thought that when you soak flaxseeds or chia seeds it can be used for your brownie recipe as an alternative to your eggs.
When flaxseed are soaked in water it will have the same binding effect that eggs do. It is also used as a vegan replacement for your eggs.
When using flaxseed as egg substitute, mix 1 tbsp. of flaxseed (ground powder) with at least 3 tbsp. of water for each egg replacement.
Commercial Egg replacers
Commercial egg substitute can be found in your local grocery stores. Most of the time, these commercial egg alternatives have instructions at the back of the packing on how to use to replace eggs for your brownies without eggs recipe.
Baking Soda
There are times when adding eggs to a recipe acts as a leavening agent, in this case using baking soda can also expand the dough when used in your egg free brownies.
As an egg alternative, mix 1 tbsp. of apple cider vinegar or white distilled vinegar with 1 tsp. of baking soda for one egg in your brownies without eggs recipe.
Vegetable oil
If your brownie mix only requires one egg to replace it with, you can use vegetable oil as an alternative. But if you will be replacing more than one egg, it is not recommended to use vegetable oil as it will make your brownies too oily. So, generally when you use vegetable oil to replace 1 egg, simply use 1/4 cup of vegetable oil to add to your brownie recipe.
Arrowroot
Arrow root is a root vegetable that is usually available in powder form. It is commonly used as a thickening agent and known to be a gluten free flour. It has the same consistency as that of a cornstarch.
To replace 1 egg for your eggless brownies, you can use 1 tbsp. of arrow root powder and then mix it with 3 tbsp. of water.
Common Ingredients used for homemade brownies
The list below are some of the ingredients used for your brownie mix as well as each of the ingredients alternatives because there are also instances in which some of the ingredients is not available at all times in your kitchen.
- Flour : All purpose flour is the recommended flour for making brownies. It is not advisable use other flour varieties such as cake flour, wheat flour or bread flour.
- Cornstarch
- Salt : Sea salt or Kosher salt is the recommended type of salt. But if you will be using a table handy instead, make sure to reduce the amount of salt into half.
- Vinegar : white vinegar or apple cider vinegar works well.
- Baking powder : Check the label for expiration date.
- Sugar : either white granulated sugar or brown sugar will do.
- Butter : Unsalted butter is preferable but if you salted butter is only available for you to use, you can use it but make sure to no longer add salt to the recipe.
- Pure Vanilla extract : if you want to have that optimum flavor of your brownies, make sure to sure pure vanilla extract.
- Unsweetened cocoa powder : it adds to the texture of the eggless brownies making its center soft.
- Milk : whole milk is recommended especially when making eggless baked goods.
- Chocolate chips
Eggless Brownies Recipe
If you want to make homemade brownies without eggs, follow the recipe below for that delicious and fluffy brownies without eggs.
Servings: 16 eggless brownies
Ingredients:
- 1 cup sugar
- 4 ounces melted butter
- 1/3 cup of milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 3/4 cup cocoa powder
- 3/4 tsp. baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup chocolate chips
Instructions:
- Preheat your oven to at least 350°F or 180°C.
- Using an 8×8 inch sized baking pan, line it with parchment paper and spray it using cooking spray. You can also use foil to line the pan with.
- Meanwhile, mix together in a large bowl the melted butter and the sugar.
- Add milk and vanilla extract and whisk it to mix them.
- In another bowl, mix together baking powder, salt, flour and cocoa powder.
- Add the mixed dry ingredients to the wet mixture, combine them all by mixing them together to make a brownie batter
- Pour batter to the prepared pan. Make sure batter is evenly spread to the pan.
- Sprinkle chocolate chips on top or you can add chocolate chips to brownie batter
- Place inside the oven and bake for at least 30 minutes until tops are cracked and shiny.
- Set aside for brownie to cool down on a wire rack.
- Once brownies cool completely, using a thin knife cut cakey brownies into squares or any shape you want.
- Serve.
How to Store and Freeze Brownies
When there are leftover brownies, do not put it to waste as you can still cover and store them when placed at room temperature and can still be eaten even within 7 days.
On the other hand, freezing brownies is also possible and can be left in the freezer for up to 3 months. To do this, make sure brownies are cooled completely then wrap using a plastic wrap, then wrap again in a foil. Placed wrapped brownies in an airtight freezer bag and placed inside the freezer.
Frequently Asked Questions
While both can be used for baking sweets, the recommended pan should be made of metal. When metal pans are used, the heat are evenly distributed within the entire pan creating an evenly baked goods. Though if you want to bake sweets quickly, use glass pans instead of metal pan. But when glass pans are used, make sure to decrease the temperature of the oven by 25 degrees so as not to burn or overbake what your are baking.
After removing baked brownies from the oven, allow it to completely cool off before slicing it using a plastic knife. But if you do not have a plastic knife to cut it with, you can still use a regular knife but make sure the knife is covered with cooking spray.
Yes, you can definitely add nuts that are finely chopped. Nuts such as walnuts or pecans. The recommended amount to add is between 1/2 to 3/4 cups of finely chopped nuts.
Conclusion
There are many egg substitutes that you can use to replace eggs when making brownies and these are mentioned above. Whatever the reason you have to replace eggs, make sure to use egg alternatives and not to exclude them in your brownie recipe since egg is one of the main ingredient to make a delicious brownies.
Since most of the boxed brownie mix also uses eggs, you can also use from the lists of alternatives.
Try using the egg substitutes in this article and let us know which one works best for you.