Aquafaba (The Egg Alternative)
1 | cup
Easy |
Aquafaba is made from leftover water after boiling your chickpeas and so is the perfect example of zero waste cooking. It is quickly growing as a popular egg white alternative and can be used in many recipes that call for eggs. This can make your recipes vegan friendly as well as suitable for those that may have egg allergies. It's super simple to make and if you are making chickpeas anyway for your dinner or hummus just save the juice.
Ingredients
🌱 = Get It From The Source
2 cups of dried chickpeas 🌱
8 cups of water
Method
- Soak chickpeas in plenty of water for at least 10 hours, ideally overnight.
- Rinse the chickpeas and place in a pot and cover with 8 cups of fresh water. Cover and bring to a boil.
- After the water boils reduce the heat to low-medium and simmer the chickpeas with the lid on until the chickpeas are cooked. This should take around 60-70 minutes.
- After the chickpeas have cooked let them cool in the water.
- Now remove the chickpeas being sure to save the water. Consider using a small sieve or maybe a slotted spoon. Try to use clean utensils to keep the liquid clear of impurities.
- You may want to consider if the liquid needs to be further reduced (see below), this will depend on what consistency your recipe calls for (see below)
- Finally, allow the liquid to cool to room temperature and then keep the liquid in the fridge to allow the aquafaba to get that egg white consistency.
Note:
- The cooked liquid should keep for about 3 days.
- The consistency of the liquid can vary and you can control this by reducing it further after cooking. A more gelatinous liquid will give you more bind, but will also taste more of the chickpeas. So you need to balance the binding consistency with the flavour profile. This may take some trial and error.
What to do with Aquafaba?
Aquafaba can be used in a number of ways:
- It can be added to recipes unwhipped as an egg binder
- It can be whipped into semi-stiff peaks and added to recipes as a whipped egg white substitute
- It can be whipped into stiff peaks and made into things like meringues
- Some recipes have suggested adding a touch (1/8th of a teaspoon) of cream of tartar to make for a firmer whip.
