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Conversions

For a long time I had only old-fashioned scales with weights in pounds and ounces. Now I have a horrible little bowl scale with a needle and scale in imperial and metric. And I moved from the UK to the US, so have taken on more tendency to use cups instead. Over the years I've worked with mostly gas ovens, with all sorts of quirks, and setting scales mostly in C but currently in F. So I'm always having to look up conversions / moving merrily between all different units, sometimes in the space of a single recipe.

Weight:
1 lb = 16 oz
2 oz = 50 g

Volume:
1 cup = 240 ml = 8 fl oz = 0.4 pints
1 tbsp = 15 ml = 3 tsp

Temperature:
C = (F-32) * 5/9
350F = 175C
400F = 204C
450F = 232C


Common Baking Substitutions:

To substitute oil for butter, use 2/3 of the recommended quantity.

To substitute for egg in most cake recipes, use 1 tbsp ground linseed (if using pre-ground, keep it in the freezer) plus 2.5 tbsp boiling water mixed up together to replace each egg. And consider adding a little vinegar to the (fake) milk if the recipe calls for milk as well as egg.


Vocabulary:
I tend to use the British name for an ingredient where there is a choice. Some of the British / American differences I know of are:

Aubergine / Eggplant: The same thing, I use aubergine.

Baking soda / Bicarbonate of soda: I grew up calling it bicarbonate of soda, so that is what it will remain.

Beet/Beetroot: I say beetroot, you may say beet, they are the same.

Biscuit / Cookie / Scone: The most obvious one of all. The British biscuit is the American cookie, although the classical form of each is different - the Brit biscuit is smaller and crunchy / crispier, while the American cookie is bigger and fattier and often soft / squishy (especially in the British interpretation). Meanwhile, the American biscuit is similar to a British scone, and what Americans call a scone is fairly similar to a scone but usually much sweeter and the wrong shape.

Celeriac / Celery root: the same thing.

Chickpea / Garbanzo bean / gram / chana: Chickpeas go by many names, I mostly say chickpea which I think is the most common name. Sometimes when referring to chickpea flour, I may call it gram flour.

Coriander/Cilantro: I try to say 'fresh coriander' where referring to fresh coriander leaves, and 'coriander seed' or 'ground coriander' where referring to the dried seed spice.

Cornstarch / Cornflour / Corn flour / Cornmeal / Polenta / Cornmeal mush: What is known in the UK as cornflour is known in the US as cornstarch (the fine white powder used for cheat-thickening sauces etc). Confusingly, fine ground corn flour (for GF baking) also exists, which is a different thing. And coarser ground corn is cornmeal or polenta, which are the same thing, although polenta is also used to describe cornmeal cooked with water or milk to make a thick porridge (cornmeal mush).

Courgette / Zucchini: The same thing, I use courgette.

Demerara sugar / turbinado sugar / raw sugar: Not quite the same thing (as for treacle / molasses, demerara comes from sugar beet processing and turbinado from cane), but close enough to substitute.

Lemonade: usually fizzy in the UK, usually not fizzy in the US (see Pimm's below).

Linseed / flax seed: The same thing.

Jam / Jelly / Jello / Marmalade: As I understand it,'jam' is used for a spread made of fruit preserved in sugar, marmalade similar but with citrus fruit, and 'jelly' either for a sieved version of a jam with no bits in it, or for the wobbly gelatin dessert (known as jello in American).

Muffin: I basically always use 'muffin' to describe the American type of little, not-too-sweet breakfasty cakey thing. English muffins (known always as 'English muffins') seem to be more popular in America than in the UK, and if I ever refer to them I will make the distinction.

Oatmeal / porridge / oats / steelcut oats: When I say 'oatmeal' I mean something like steelcut oats. When I say 'porridge' I mean oats cooked with water or milk, which is known in America as oatmeal.

Plain flour / all-purpose flour: These are, I believe, slightly different things, but the closest to equivalent among the flours. Of course, I am mostly using AP and saying plain.

Swede/Turnip/Rutabaga: This is the big, yellow one. In Scottish it is a turnip (or neep), in English this is a swede (and a turnip is the small, white/purple one, same in American), in American this is rutabaga. Confusing? Yes.

Treacle / Molasses: Not quite the same thing (black treacle comes from sugar beet processing, molasses from sugar cane processing), but good enough to substitute.


Peculiarly British ingredients:
There are three British ingredients that I look out for and buy on a regular basis even though they are expensive here: golden syrup, Bird's custard powder and ginger wine...

Black Treacle: Thick, irony, sweet, dark-coloured syrupy substance used for baking, especially for gingerbread, parkin and the like. Similar to molasses so I usually substitute with molasses.

Custard powder (Bird's): Powder to be mixed with milk for making eggless custard - very widely used in the UK, I prefer it to eggy custard although it is a quite different thing.

Digestive biscuits: The main brand is McVities, they are slightly sweet, crumbly, plain biscuits (see ' biscuit' above).

Golden syrup: thick, golden looking and tasting, pure (cane or beet) sugar syrup. similar in consistency to corn syrup but not the same - corn syrup as far as I know does not taste of much by itself and usually has additives to give it colour and taste.

Ginger wine (Stone's or Crabbie's): Sweet sherry like wine made from raisins and ginger - the kind of wine that keeps well on the shelf when opened. Wonderful for poaching fruit, and a great drink when mixed with lime juice (and cachaca for a despicably tasty Scottish-Brazilian capirinha abomination), tonic water or whisky (=a Whisky Mac).

Mixed spice: a mixture of ground (cloves), cinnamon, (ginger), allspice, nutmeg used for baking. Not to be confused with allspice.

Pimm's: Mysterious, sweet, alcoholic 'fruit cup'. Mix on ice with fizzy lemonade, chopped cucumber, strawberries, citrus, crushed mint, and borage flowers (if you can find some) for the ultimate summer drink.

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