Last weekend, I broke the number one rule I share with everyone who asks me for baking advice: to make sure you have all your ingredients before starting the recipe. But there I was, halfway through cracking an egg, when I looked over to the shelf where I keep dry ingredients to see my sugar jar woefully near-empty. I wasn’t about to sprint to the grocery store just for sugar (I’m also still keeping grocery trips as minimal as possible these days); I needed a sugar substitute, stat.
Luckily, because I keep a fairly stocked pantry, I had several options. There are actually a number of ingredients that mimic granulated sugar’s flavor and texture in both cooking and baking; you just need to think a bit about what you’re making and what each substitute brings to the table. For example, a ripe banana can swap in just fine when you’re baking a cake, but it wouldn’t work in, say, a caramel sauce. Not every one of these substitutions will replace sugar perfectly in every recipe you try, but they will help you achieve a similar goal in a pinch.