Living without: Ingredient substitutes
Since some items can not be found, are hard to find, or very expensive; we have to get a little creative in the kitchen.
Here are some good substitutes when running across these items in recipes.
*Butter milk is something you cannot find here but you could order in powder form through iHerb. If you don’t want to do a special order, here are a few options you could try:
1 cup of milk + 1 table spoon of vinegar
OR
1 cup of milk + 1 tablespoon of lemon
Whisk them together and let stand for 5 min and the milk will start to curdle.
Now you have buttermilk.
*Strained yogurt for a ricotta.
Another suggestion for ricotta is to use cottage cheese with a teaspoon of sugar.
*The use of Mizu-ame instead of corn syrup was suggested by another member from JFR(Japan Friendly Recipes).
*Mix Kurosato with sanoto for brown sugar
*Use of sake to replace dry wine in recipes. Another member in JFR uses it instead of wine.
*Shochu is a good replacement for vodka. Some stores do carry it but it does cost more.
*A good replacement for one ounce of unsweetened chocolate is 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa and 1 tablespoon butter, shortening, or coconut oil.
*Use chopped renko to replace water chestnuts.
*Use nerigoma instead of tahini when making hammus.
*If you happened to get an aluminum taste when using baking powder, a good substitute would be cream of tartar and baking soda.
*To make self rising flour:
Add 1 teaspoon baking powder and 1/4 teaspoon salt to 3/4 cup of plain flour.
*To make cake floor:
Place one tablespoon of corn starch and then fill the rest of the cup with white flour.
*Pumpkin spice: Mix cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, or clove and ginger.
*Cream of tartar is available from iHerb but if you happen to be making Meringue, use a teaspoon or two of lemon juice or vinegar to replace it.
*Ponzu is a good to replacement for anything that needs some saltiness and a bit of citrus.
*You can make tabasco with chili, vinegar, and salt.
*For sweet chili sauce use chili, vinegar, and sugar.
*Tonkatsu sauce could be used to replace BBQ or worchester sauce in recipes.
Thanks to both Japan Friendly Recipes and the KA International group members for the information; as this will be able to help many people living in Japan.
If you come across any other ingredient substitutes, please let us know.
About Kim Sato
I'm from Oregon and I'm a mother to 2 very active boys. I live in the Tokyo area and try to make the most of living in Japan.
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I need to try that homemade tabasco! Before I discovered FBC and then Costco came around, I made my own BBQ sauce from scratch, it wasn’t too bad!
My moms husband was trying to teach me how to do that but now so many stores around Tokyo have it. Things keep on changing.
What fantastic tips. Now to try them out!
Hope they help.
This is such a great post! Ricotta cheese is hard to come by, so I will try this method, very cool!
Let us know how it goes.
Love it! You can also do a pretty good approximation of sour cream by mixing vinegar or lemon juice with cream if you can find it unsweetened.
I will see about adding that one as well. Thank you!