Transform Soy Milk Into Vegan Buttermilk With One Extra Ingredient

Buttermilk is the secret weapon behind many classic recipes, serving to tenderize and season proteins, enhance the fluffiness of biscuits and cornbread, and bring tangy, rich notes to creamy salad dressings like this buttermilk ranch recipe. If you're looking for a vegan substitute for this versatile and transformative ingredient, it's easy enough to convert soy milk with the help of one acidic ingredient. All it takes is adding a tablespoon of vinegar to a cup of soy milk to create the plant-based equivalent of the thickness and taste of buttermilk. 

In fact, vinegar is also the key to making regular buttermilk out of dairy milk in a pinch. All you have to do is add a tablespoon of apple cider or white vinegar to a 1 or 2-cup measuring pitcher, pour a cup of soy milk in, give it a quick stir, and let the mixture sit for a few minutes. The acid will effectively curdle the soy milk in the same way it curdles the dairy milk. If you don't have vinegar, you can also use lemon juice.

And if you don't have soy milk, oat, cashew, and almond milk are other good plant-based milk alternatives you can convert to vegan buttermilk using lemon juice or vinegar, though not all will curdle as well as soy milk and you may have to add baking soda to get the reaction to work. The flavor and texture between plant-based and dairy-based buttermilk will be surprisingly similar. However, dairy-based buttermilk, like yogurt, contains beneficial bacterial cultures to help it ferment that you won't get in soy buttermilk.

Vegan buttermilk supplies all the same benefits as its dairy-based counterpart when it comes to cooking and baking, and will thus help you make the best vegan baked goods, frying batters, sauces, dressings, and dips. Just like dairy buttermilk, vegan buttermilk is the acidic component your baked goods need to help their crumb rise and become nice and fluffy. In fact, the reaction between baking soda or baking powder and vegan buttermilk plays an even bigger role in helping vegan baked goods rise in the absence of eggs. Transform a basic buttermilk cornbread recipe into a vegan version by adding your vegan buttermilk, then adding ⅓ cup of oil or ¼ cup of vegan butter. 

The fat and buttermilk are enough to make your cornbread rise into a moist buttery crumb without eggs or an egg substitute. Similarly, you can swap regular buttermilk with vegan buttermilk and regular butter for your favorite vegan butter brand in our recipe for fluffy Southern biscuits. Vegan buttermilk, Vegenaise, vegan yogurt, and a blend of dill, parsley, onion powder, garlic powder, and mustard powder will also make for a delicious vegan ranch dressing to accompany these sticky garlic cauliflower wings. You can even mix vegan buttermilk with flour, cornstarch, seasonings, and beer to make a batter for onion rings.