Lesson 1: The Basics
This lesson will discuss the difference between yeast and baking soda/powder risen breads, different types of flour, liquids, flavorings and fats used in quick breads, and the basic tools needed for quick breads.
Quick vs. Slow
The types of breads most people think about first when they think about baking are yeast breads, those beautiful loaves full of character that take all day (or even longer) to make. This is why many people are intimidated by home baking.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. There’s another method that produces great bread in much less time. These loaves, or muffins, biscuits, scones and cakes, are leavened by baking soda and/or baking powder, which allows them to rise in minutes instead of hours.
As we learned in the introduction to this course, bicarbonate of soda, commonly known as baking soda, makes carbon dioxide, and therefore bubbles, in combination with acid, such as lemon juice, buttermilk or vinegar. And baking powder, which is a combination of baking soda and other chemicals as well as cornstarch to keep the chemicals from prematurely reacting, is also used to make breads rise. Baking powder has its own acid included in the mix, so it is used in the absence of other acids. Many recipes call for both baking powder and baking soda.
You can substitute baking powder for baking soda, but it may not produce the best results because the extra acid needed to neutralize the baking soda may be unbalanced without that ingredient. If you try it, remember soda is four times as strong as baking powder, so four teaspoons of powder would substitute for one teaspoon of soda. You can also make your own baking powder. For a teaspoon of baking powder, you can substitute ¼ teaspoon of baking soda and ½ teaspoon cream of tartar.
As Beth Hensperger explains in “The Best Quick Breads,” modern baking powders are called double acting because the rising action begins when the powder is mixed with the wet ingredients but it activates again in the heat of the oven, producing much more predictably puffy products than our ancestors knew.
