Baking Soda & Baking Powder Are Absolutely Not the Same Ingredient
Baking Soda & Baking Powder Are Absolutely Not the Same Ingredient
I was in elementary school in the early 2000s, which meant that most of my Fridays were spent with Bill Nye the Science Guy. He made this 10-year-old aspiring writer/artist/cooking-show host care about, or at least be inquisitive about, science. And even though I barely made it out of high school chemistry, and ultimately pursued my dream writing career, I never really escaped chemistry because the truth is, cooking and science intersect far more often than I’d like. At the heart of that interaction are two very science-y ingredients: baking soda and baking powder. But what’s the difference between them anyway?
Let’s get some facts straight, because that’s what Bill Nye would like me to do: baking soda is a chemical compound also known as sodium bicarbonate also known as NaHCO₃. And this dry ingredient is a powerhouse: It can absorb nasty odors from your refrigerator just as well as it can help cakes and cookies bake beautifully. When baking soda is combined with an acidic ingredient such as lemon juice, vinegar, cream of tartar, or buttermilk, it will cause baked goods to rise. “That’s why you see so many classic recipes for buttermilk pancakes and buttermilk biscuits or cake recipes that contain vinegar. The buttermilk is not just a flavoring agent—it provides the necessary acid to react with the baking soda and leaven the bread,” explains J. Kenji Lopez-Alt in The Food Lab.