Baking is a finicky practice. Exact measurements and fussy techniques require your full attention, and substituting ingredients means you’re liable to upset the whole delicate balance. But for those who avoid eating dairy for any number of reasons, swapping in a plant-based product for the butter or milk that a recipe calls for is the only way to have your cake and eat it, too. The vegan dairy market has exploded with options in recent years, but it’s hard to know exactly which new alternative will make your cakes or cookies shine—and which will turn them into glop in the oven.
Yogurt is often the ringer ingredient in a baked good, the unassuming addition that is actually doing way more work than it seems. I love adding a scoop to a jam-swirled snacking cake or batch of tangy fried doughnuts, but I’m not a yogurt-eater in regular life, so I always have to buy a container specifically for baking. If I could buy a plant-based version instead—if I knew which of the myriad options at my grocery store would actually make for a good cake—I absolutely would, but the risk of ruining dessert has always seemed too great. At least, until now, because I convinced my workplace to let me test ten of the leading brands to determine the very best non-dairy yogurt for baking.
The results were all edible, but a few products in particular rose above the rest; if you’ve ever been a baker, standing in front of a yogurt cake, asking it to not trigger your lactose intolerance, this one’s for you.
Why bake with yogurt?
Yogurt makes baked goods moist and tender, with a subtle and balancing tang. Like buttermilk and sour cream, the acidity in yogurt reacts with baking soda to lift a cake or batch of muffins as it bakes, making it a favorite ingredient in recipes that require significant rise. Yogurts with higher fat contents add the most moisture and richness, which is why you’ll often see recipes call for “full-fat” in the ingredients list. It’s also important to note the style of yogurt that a recipe requires; Greek yogurt, which has less whey and more protein than regular yogurt, makes for a thicker batter and puffier, more structured end result.
The testing process
I chose a straightforward, two-bowl loaf cake with a combination of baking powder and baking soda as the test recipe for this experiment because I wanted an easy, replicable project that would let the yogurt stand out. With very little added flavoring (just a bit of lemon zest and vanilla extract), this recipe puts the taste of each yogurt on display. The winning brand needed to impart as little of its own flavor onto the finished product as possible, offering the same kind of blank (but tangy!) slate as regular dairy-based yogurt. I also liked this recipe because aside from the yogurt, it is entirely dairy-free; I didn’t want to judge a baked good that relied on other milk products to work out.
The simple nature of a loaf cake meant I could learn a lot about how each product performed in the oven. The crumb, how much it rose, how much it cracked, how much it browned, whether or not it puffed into a T shape over the edges of the pan—all of these visual and textural factors offered clues as to how good of a substitute the non-dairy yogurts made.
To qualify for this test, the yogurts I selected had to be regular (a.k.a. not Greek-style), plain, and unsweetened when applicable. I aimed to test a variety of base ingredients to reflect the most popular alt-milk styles today, and to only use brands that could be easily sourced in-store or online. At first I was concerned that plant-based yogurts might not react the same way with baking soda as their dairy-filled counterparts do, so I bought a pack of litmus strips and tested each yogurt to be sure. But the results showed a nearly identical acidity level (a pH between 4 and 5) to the dairy-based variety.
I was less concerned about each yogurt’s flavor and texture right out of the container than I would have been if testing with granola or blended into a smoothie; the winners here don’t necessarily reflect the best all-purpose non-dairy yogurts, just the ones that are most successful in baking.
In addition to the ten non-dairy yogurts I tried, I also made one loaf cake exactly as the recipe intended, with full fat dairy-based yogurt to use as a control. The resulting loaf cake, against which I compared every other bake, stayed entirely within the pan, with no T of dough sticking out over the sides. It was bouncy and just moist enough, with a characteristic crack down the center of its peak, and golden-brown edges. I baked each cake until it met the visual cue listed in the recipe (“until a tester inserted into center comes out clean”) which was universally five to ten minutes longer than the whole milk version.
The best overall: 365 Almond Milk Yogurt
I was not expecting greatness from the Whole Foods in-store brand, but this yogurt yielded what was clearly the very best non-dairy loaf cake of the bunch. Closest of all ten in shape and crumb to the dairy-based version, the 365 almond milk yogurt loaf was nicely spongy and moist. It was clean in flavor, with no trace of almond, which makes this alt-yogurt a great substitute no matter the flavor of your baking project. And the cake stayed nicely blonde in color, with minimal browning on the edges and base.
The 365 almond milk yogurt is relatively thin and settles a bit in the container, so it requires some serious stirring before use. It also features a surprising ingredients list, which initially worried me texture-wise: In addition to almonds, water, and the usual live and active cultures, there is a thickening trifecta of tapioca starch, pectin, and agar-agar. Somehow this ended up creating the perfect crumb in the final cake, with a structure that could’ve passed for a dairy-filled version. It’s the plant-based yogurt I’ll be turning to for sweet and savory projects alike from here on out.
365 Non-Dairy Almond Milk Yogurt, 32 oz
$7.00, Whole Foods
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Runner-up: Forager’s Cashew Milk Yogurt
Forager’s non-dairy yogurt is cashew-based, much like my favorite vegan ice cream; I had high hopes that the cake made with this brand would outperform the others. And in many ways, it did deliver: The loaf rose well into a robust T but wasn’t overly airy, browned just slightly on the edges, and stayed nicely moist, thanks to the high fat content in the yogurt. It was also plain in flavor—a good thing for versatility purposes, though it did have the tiniest bit of nutty undertone. Altogether, it made a perfectly acceptable cake, and should be considered an easy one-for-one swap for whole milk yogurt in baking.
Forager Dairy-Free Cashew Milk Yogurt, 24 oz
$6.00, Fresh Direct
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The best for specific projects: Anita’s Coconut Yogurt
Anita’s is unabashedly a coconut yogurt; if your baked good can handle that, it makes a great non-dairy substitute. The loaf made with Anita’s was fragrant and flavorful, so much so that I would have called it a coconut cake rather than a yogurt cake. It also souffléd up in a big way, puffing and baking into an inviting deep golden brown. It was slightly firmer than the dairy-based cake but still quite light to eat, and was the only cake of the lot I came back to for seconds.
For certain sweet and savory baking projects with other added flavors, a coconut-based yogurt with this much coconut flavor is not a good idea. I can imagine certain combinations clashing with the tropical (but not artificial) taste. But for a basic loaf cake, snacking cake, single layer cake, or muffins, it makes for a delightful twist.
Anita’s Coconut Milk Yogurt, 16 oz
$12.00, Mercato
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How the other yogurts fared
I briefly turned into a lemon loaf machine while testing all of these non-dairy yogurts, sifting and whisking and greasing pans with abandon. I expected that, with the variety of base ingredients in the yogurts I used, there would be some flops, but in actuality, all 10 brands technically worked: no droopy cakes, no liquid middles, no overly crisped edges. In that way, you can probably feel confident using any non-dairy yogurt as a substitute if it’s all you have on hand. But the three brands listed above yielded the most superlative results, and the rest fell short for one reason or another. Read on for a few details about each test.
One note: I aimed to cover all the most common non-dairy milk base ingredients in this test, but you’ll notice that there is no soy milk yogurt on this list. That’s because at the six grocery stores closest to my apartment (I went on a yogurt-buying crawl), I could not find a single such product for sale. Some research revealed this is a much less common item then I would have assumed—but if you have a brand you know and love, I want to hear about it! As the non-dairy yogurt market expands, I hope to add to this review, incorporating new and potentially overlooked brands.
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Oatly Oatgurt: This cake was tender and well-puffed (with a very big T!), and definitely the better of the two oat milk loaves. But it had a strong metallic aftertaste that was impossible to ignore.
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Nancy’s Oat Milk Yogurt: Moist but crumbly, this loaf cake was off-puttingly sour in flavor, well beyond the normal tang of yogurt.
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Lavva Plant-Based Yogurt: Made with a coconut cream, pili nut, and plantain (!!) base, this yogurt was the outlier in the group in terms of flavor and color. It made for a cake that was very specifically flavored (tahini-ish and earthy, in a way that overpowered any sweetness) and grey in color.
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Silk Almond Milk Yogurt: Silk’s almond milk yogurt is sweetened with cane sugar, so the resulting cake had a very present, sweetened almond flavor throughout. It was quite firm in texture, and featured the deepest crack down the center.
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Kite Hill Almond Milk Yogurt: A favorite brand among plant-based dairy aficionados, Kite Hill’s plain, unsweetened yogurt made for a cleanly-flavored cake, with no almond undertones (a surprise, because the yogurt by itself is very almondy). It was, however, both too firm and too dry.
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Cocojune Coconut Yogurt: The loaf made with Cocojune was not just coconutty—it was tropical-vacation-sunscreen coconut flavored, so much so that I could smell it from the oven. It was dense and moist, with a wide T.
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So Delicious Coconut Yogurt: This coconut yogurt made for the least coconut-flavored cake. It was well-browned on the edges and bottom, quite moist, with a very flat top—virtually no crack to speak of.
The takeaway
For the best results when using non-dairy yogurt in a baking project, use 365 Almond Milk Yogurt or Forager’s Cashew Milk Yogurt. Both provide a clean slate for whatever other flavors you may wish to incorporate into your baking, and create a crumb that is as moist and tender as the dairy-laden stuff. For a distinctly flavored cake or muffin, try Anita’s Coconut Yogurt, which puffs up magically and is delightfully fragrant.
Originally Appeared on Epicurious
