Dairy-free, kid-friendly baking???

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I'm a teacher at a Montessori school. I've done a lot of baking with the kids. We're a nut-free school, and I don't use soy, chocolate, or other beans or nuts anyway. In the past, I've always been able to modify recipes to make them safe and delicious for me and my students. Usually we make muffins, bars, or cookies.

A colleague of mine in a preschool classroom (ages 3 - 5) has asked me to bake with her class. I am trying to come up with something delicious to do with them, but it's hard to find anything that is safe, because one student is severely allergic to all dairy and egg products.

I've never had trouble finding (or creating) recipes without nuts, soy, or other allergenic plant products. But this one is a stumper.

Does anyone know of any good recipes that do not contain nuts, soy, chocolate, milk, butter, or eggs? I've got a great banana muffin recipe somewhere that has no milk, but still contains egg.

Are there good soy-free egg replacements available?

Thank you for any recipes or replacement ideas you might have!

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Applesauce.

You can use it in fake brownies, bread recipies, and most anything else that would require milk.

I say MOST.. because applesauce only gives a little "strength" to breads and things like that and in some cases, it can cause your bread to be kinda sticky.

The best place to replace milk and eggs are brownies and bananna bread.

I too have a child who is allergic to milk. Though, she can eat egg, i prefer her not to. And apple sauce has been my saving grace!

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My grandmother, Nannie, used to make this amazing cake that had no dairy. It used fruit juice to keep it moist. The recipe was from the Depression when dairy was so hard to come by.

Her recipe was called "the eggless, milkless, butterless cake" but I think I have seen similar recipes called "Depression cake".

Nannie's was better than any other I've tried but they're all pretty good. Let me see if I can find one....

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boom accidently made a good point.

Google the word recipie and then what ever you are looking for

and use the google tip

( - ) for what you DONT want to come up
( + ) for what you do want

Example-

( google) Bananna bread recipie -milk -egg -nuts +applesauce

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This sounds pretty similar to hers:

Quote:

Depression Cake
An old time favorite- heavy, moist, and spicy

2 cups sugar
2 cups strong coffee*
1/2 cup shortening
2 cups Sun-Maid Raisins
1 apple, peeled and grated
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon cloves
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 cup chopped nuts

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SIMMER together the sugar, coffee, shortening, raisins, and grated apple for 10 minutes in a medium saucepan, stirring occasionally.
COOL for 10 more minutes.
BLEND together the remaining dry ingredients and stir into the saucepan mixture.
POUR batter into well-greased and floured 13"x9" pan.
BAKE at 350ºF. for 25 to 30 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
COOL and dust with powdered sugar if desired.
*Water may be substituted in place of the coffee.

I know that she used more dried fruit.

She would soak the dried fruit for a day prior to making the cake....

This was/is my favorite cake in the universe.

She never wrote down the recipe.

If she wasn't dead, I'd kill her.

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Of course, ya'll remember that marycat is a pro chef

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didnt know that

i could learn something here. ;-)

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Well now marycat might just be a pro chef but she's no Nannie.

Nannie could take dirt and dust bunnies and turn them into a delicious meal.

(She was a dust bowl girl.)

<sob>

I miss my Nannie!!

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No matter how much training I've got, I'm certainly no Nannie!

Applesauce and bananas seem to be the best non-commercial replacements for eggs, from all the reading I've been doing. And I've always used them to replace excess fat and sugar in recipes too. I'm a little cautious to reduce the fat TOO far when I haven't got eggs to make up for the flavor and body, so I'm keeping a fair amount in this time. And I always use at least part whole grain flour, no matter what I make with the kids.

My biggest concern with this (draft) recipe is the amount of baking powder. The amounts vary so widely in all the recipes, and without the egg to hold the structure, I'm just not sure how much leavening we'll get. I've read that you should add back in 1/4 to 1/2 tsp baking powder for every egg you take out. But too much baking powder makes for an out of control muffin!

Here's what I've cobbled together from looking at about a zillion recipes. I'll try it out, and let you all know.

Mary's eggless blueberry banana applesauce muffins!

1/2 c corn oil
1 c applesauce
1/4 c packed brown sugar
1 1/2 c banananananana

1 c whole wheat flour
1 1/2 c all purpose flour
4 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon

2 c frozen (because that's what we have a lot of at school) blueberries.

375 20 min

I'm going to go procure some ingredients and do a dry run. Hopefully I will find some overripe bananas somewhere...

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Final Recipe!
The first attempt at batter was way too dry. After readjusting for moisture, they were actually pretty tasty! They rose and made a nice texture, and had a good flavor. The only problem was that the muffins felt compelled to stick to the paper liners.

The final version:

BANANA BLUEBERRY APPLESAUCE MUFFINS

1 c. whole wheat flour
1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
4 1/2 tsp. aluminum-free baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon

3 ripe medium bananas
1/2 c. corn oil
2 c. organic unsweetened applesauce
1/4 c. light brown sugar, or organic Sucanat if you've got it

2 c. frozen blueberries

1/4 c. brown sugar for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 375. Line muffin tins with paper liners (I make my muffins rather petite, and I got 28.) or grease the tins well.

Sift together the flours, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.

In a big bowl, mash the bananas well. Thoroughly mix in oil, applesauce, and sugar.

Gently fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Fold in the berries.

Using an ice cream scoop, scoop muffins into prepared tins. Sprinkle the tops with a little more brown sugar for crunch. Bake at 375 F for about 20 minutes, until a tester comes out clean. Remove from the oven, cool on a rack, and enjoy!

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That looks like a keeper recipe!

I've got some bananas ripening for baking right now. This could work as one of my options if I sub oatmeal for some of the flour.

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You could certainly sub oats for some of the flour! I didn't want to go too too crazy with only a day to experiment, but I think that would be awesome. Please post what you do and how it turns out!

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I found this to cross with your recipe. I think it'll work.

I'm also going to try to work up a bittersweet chocolate/banana muffin. (I know chocolate/cocoa's in your no-go zone, but I think your basic recipe is eminently modifiable - think liquefied bananas as the liquid in a chocolate muffin with dried apricots and craisins tucked in Cool

I discovered that dried fruit in brownies work well, so onto the next dried fruit hidden in dessert project)

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marycat - how many children do you bake with at a time?

I was wondering if baked apples would be something that would work for your purposes - easy for each baker to slightly customize (and they cover off no nuts/no chocolate/no dairy/no eggs)

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Baked apples yum! Always a good one. And (nearly) infinitely customizable! I wonder if they'd be good filled with cream cheese, or if it would separate too much. I'll have to try it! But not with that one student.

I usually work with about 8 kids at a time. The kitchen in our school doesn't accommodate any more than that, and we still have to take out all the (huge, bulky) chairs and stand around the table!

This morning we had 3,4, and 5 year olds. Baked apples actually would have been perfect, except that they take so long to finish baking and cool, and I had to be at a gym class just after noon! As it was, I didn't get to eat my lunch until 3. But that's okay, I had a muffin and an extra banana to tide me over!

The muffins were delicious, warm or cold. When they cooled fully, they were a lot easier to unwrap, too.

Smile

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OH, I know! I know.

Baked apples should be stuffed with brown sugar.

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Brown sugar!
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!

Brown sugar is tasty! And raisins! And cinnamon! And ginger! If I hadn't just eaten breakfast (some leftover muffins that I brought home with some cream cheese and a big pile of fresh strawberries and blackberries yum!) I would be getting hungry right about now!

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Re: Final Recipe!

marycat wrote:

The first attempt at batter was way too dry. After readjusting for moisture, they were actually pretty tasty! They rose and made a nice texture, and had a good flavor. The only problem was that the muffins felt compelled to stick to the paper liners.

The final version:

BANANA BLUEBERRY APPLESAUCE MUFFINS

1 c. whole wheat flour
1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
4 1/2 tsp. aluminum-free baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon

3 ripe medium bananas
1/2 c. corn oil
2 c. organic unsweetened applesauce
1/4 c. light brown sugar, or organic Sucanat if you've got it

2 c. frozen blueberries

1/4 c. brown sugar for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 375. Line muffin tins with paper liners (I make my muffins rather petite, and I got 28.) or grease the tins well.

Sift together the flours, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.

In a big bowl, mash the bananas well. Thoroughly mix in oil, applesauce, and sugar.

Gently fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Fold in the berries.

Using an ice cream scoop, scoop muffins into prepared tins. Sprinkle the tops with a little more brown sugar for crunch. Bake at 375 F for about 20 minutes, until a tester comes out clean. Remove from the oven, cool on a rack, and enjoy!

By the way, I decided to add a teaspoon of vanilla with the kids yesterday and they came out even tastier.

And (wrapped well) they were still moist and delicious this morning. Though not quite as moist as yesterday.

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marycat - is the batter thin enough to work in a rosebud silicone pan?

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The batter is actually *almost* too dry to work, even for muffins... If you want to do a rosebud shape, I would add more liquid. Also, blueberries might be weird in such a complex shape. They might look kind of bruise-y.

Maybe eliminate the berries and add a half cup of apple juice?

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Dairy-free, kid-friendly baking???

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