Ground Almond Alternatives

Nut free swaps for cakes.

Prompted by requests for a nut-free swap in my Chocolate Easy Peasy Peeler Cake, I’ve taken a deep dive into possible alternatives for ground almonds,. And it turns out deep diving into almond alternatives is as stimulating as diving into cold water. Who knew?

I’ve concentrated on using grains, rather than seeds, because they’re considerably cheaper than ground almonds / almond flour and I’ve always got them in the baking cupboard. It also didn’t occur to me that seeds are a potentially excellent swap until a kindly person piped up in the comment section.

Nuts come ready-packed with oils so they add moisture to a cake crumb but they also add texture and structure, particularly in an egg-free batter such as the easy peeler cake. When I was devising that cake originally I tested it with ‘raw’ ground rice but it stayed gritty in the baked cake and made the crumb too dry. So my aim, with with all the grains I tested, was to hydrate them and add some fat so they leant both structure and moisture to the cake in as close a way as possible to ground nuts / nut flour.

Things I haven’t tested but will do at some point:

Cornmeal / polenta - cooked similarly to semolina and ground rice.

Pumpkin / sunflower seeds - lightly toasted if you need flavour, otherwise blitzed to fine grain, but stopping before they turn into seed butter.

Flavouring:

If you want an alternative to ground almonds because their cost is damaging to your finances, rather than dangerously damaging to your health, you can add a little almond extract or essence to any of these near the end of their cooking time.

Quantities:

The amounts listed below make just over 100g of each almond alternative.

Gluten Free:

Rolled Oats - best for nutty flavour

100g rolled oats

40g cold water

30g salted or unsalted butter - dairy or plant based

• Add the oats to a frying pan over medium heat and trickle the water the grains and stir through.

• Add the butter and stir through the oats, coating them as it melts in the pan.

• Put a lid on and steam the oats for a few minutes to plump the grains slightly.

• Remove the lid and turn up the heat to toast the grains to a golden colour to give them a toasty nutty flavour and a golden colour. Keep them moving so they colour evenly.

• Blitz half the toasted oats to a finer blend then mix back into the larger grains to give you texture closer to ground almonds. Use straight away or freeze until you need it.

Ground Rice - excellent for texture and structure

15g butter dairy or vegan

60g boiling water

60g ground rice

• Add the butter and boiling water to frying pan on medium heat.

• When the butter has melted add the rice and mix, it will immediately become porridgy but keep moving it on the heat.

• As the rice cooks the grains will soften and lose their grittiness and it will start operate back into clumps.

• Use a balloon whisk to break up the clumps then put the lid on and leave to steam for several minutes until there’s no grittiness in the rice.

• Remove the lid and use the whisk to break the rice back into fine grains, remove from the heat and leave to cool in the pan.

• When room temperature the rice should look grainy and very like ground almonds, if they are still soggy they will need to be cooked for longer.

• Use straight away or freeze until you need it.

Contains Gluten:

Semolina - best allrounder for texture and structure in a cake.

15g salted or unsalted butter - dairy or plant based

50g boiling water

60g semolina

• Add the butter and boiling water to frying pan on medium heat.

• When the butter has melted add the semolina and stir over the heat, the water will absorb quickly and the grittiness of the grains should have gone after a few minutes.

• Keep it moving in the so it loses any sogginess, breaking up the clumps with a balloon whisk as it cooks.

• When the cooked semolina looks like a slightly damp sandy switch the heat off and leave in the pan to cool.

• Use straight away or freeze until you need it.

Cous Cous - good for extra moisture in a long baked cake.

15g butter dairy or vegan

60g boiling water

60g cous cous

• Add the butter and water to a frying pan on a medium heat.

• When the butter has melted add the cous cous and stir on the heat until the water has been absorbed.

• Switch off the heat, put a lid on and leave to cool.

• Use straight away or freeze until you need it.

Tat x