Cut the Fat in Baking

Get your electric mixers and cookie sheets ready – the holidays are prime time for baking enthusiasts. Fat ensures that your baked goods will be moist and tender (pretty important!) but you can dial down the fat content and still make them delectable. Here are some simple tips on lightening up your favorite treats.
Winter Baked Goods

This week, we're giving you a bunch of cookie ideas, but we didn't want to skip on out on general baking advice, too. One big concern is all that fat. Fat ensures that your baked goods are moist and tender (pretty important!), but you can dial it down and still make them delectable with a few basic swaps.

How Much Fat Can You Cut?

The easiest way to reduce fat when cooking is to just use less oil or butter. Since baked goods require very specific measurements, that can be trickier when baking. Sometimes cutting down added fat will work; other times you’ll need to replace some of that fat with other ingredients. When trying to re-invent your favorite recipes, it may take some trial and error. Instead of wasting batches upon batches of ingredients, I like to split a recipe into thirds and make adjustments to each mini-batch. Once you discover what works best, make sure to write it down for next time -- and don't be afraid to double-check your math!

Simple Swaps to Try

The typical ingredients that add fat to your baked goods are eggs, oil, butter, shortening, milk and cream. There are several easy swaps you can make, but be warned that they may change the texture slightly. In the end, these changes will cut back on the total fat and much of the less-healthy saturated fat.

  • For cookies, replace half the butter with applesauce, egg whites or plain yogurt.
  • Replace regular butter with equal amounts of healthier buttery spreads such as Promise or Smart Balance.
  • Trade half the butter with pureed fruit such as mashed bananas, apple butter or prunes (prunes work best with chocolate recipes).
  • Replace half the oil with applesauce.
  • Replace each whole egg with two egg whites or 1/4 cup egg substitute.
  • Replace cream with equal parts of evaporated skim milk.
  • Replace half the cream cheese with equal parts of reduced-fat cottage cheese or part-skim ricotta cheese.
  • Replace each 1/2 cup shortening with 1/3 cup vegetable or canola oil.
  • Replace equal parts sour cream with plain yogurt (I like to use the Greek-style yogurt).
  • Replace whole milk with 1% or 2%.
TELL US: How do you lighten up your favorite baked goodies?

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