About Substitute Ingredient

I built Substitute Ingredient because I was tired of US-only substitute sites that don't know what thickened cream is. I wanted a tool for home cooks in Australia, the UK, New Zealand, and everywhere that uses real measurements.

Is cornstarch the same as cornflour? Is heavy cream what I know as thickened cream or double cream? Does baking soda mean the same thing as bicarbonate of soda?

Sometimes it's the same product with a different name. Sometimes it's subtly different and swapping them 1:1 will ruin the dish. The answer is rarely obvious, and searching the web usually sends you down a rabbit hole of conflicting forum posts and vague answers.

Every substitution on this site is informed by established culinary references including King Arthur Baking and Serious Eats, and tested against home cooking practice. If I'm not confident in a ratio, I don't publish it.

It's also the only substitute finder that adjusts for country — including ingredient names, measurement units, and local availability. An Australian tablespoon is 20ml, not 15ml. Cream terminology is completely different depending on where you live. These details matter when you're baking.

Even when you know exactly what an ingredient is, sometimes you simply don't have it. Maybe it's a Sunday evening and the shops are shut. Maybe the recipe calls for something you can only find at a specialty store that's forty minutes away — or doesn't exist in your town at all.

Most of the time, there is something in your pantry that will work. You just need to know what it is, how much to use, and whether it matters for this particular dish.