7 Egg Substitutes That Actually Work for Baking, Scrambling, and More

Picking the best option starts with understanding how eggs function in your recipe. Experts explain how to choose.

You don't have to shell out the big bucks to enjoy your favorite recipes. Rawpixel

So the bank turned down your financing application for a dozen eggs, but you’re craving pancakes and you promised you’d make brownies for that work party. What do you do?

The current bird flu crisis has sent the price of eggs skyrocketing. According to the USDA, egg prices rose by 53 percent between January 2024 and January 2025, and are predicted to increase another 41.1 percent this year. That pinch in the pocketbook reminds us just how often eggs are part of ingredient lists.

Fortunately, as with most recipes, there are almost always substitutions for ingredients if you run out. Some work better than others. We called three lifelines for their expert opinions on the best egg substitutes and the merits or weaknesses of each.

The Magic of Eggs

An egg is “such a complex little package,” said Hannah Crowley, an executive editor for America’s Test Kitchen Reviews and co-host of Gear Heads on YouTube. Eggs have a high fat content that enriches recipes and emulsifies batters, preventing mixed ingredients from separating. They create a softer crumb in cakes and breads and keep them moist, and help in leavening and browning. They contribute to the thick, silky texture of sweet custards and pastry creams, and savory sauces such as mayonnaise and hollandaise.

“They can be like a dense quiche or a soufflé,” Crowley said. “It all depends on how you manipulate them.”

So to choose the right egg substitute for a recipe, “you want to have an awareness of how the egg is functioning,” said Melanie Marcus, a registered dietitian and nutrition and health communications manager for Dole Food Company.

It’s near impossible to find one substitute that can replace all those functions. So you’ll need to choose based on your recipe.

For Cakes, Pancakes, Brownies, and Other Baked Goods

“Most of the time, eggs are added to a recipe to act as a binder,” Ann Ziata, chef at the Institute of Culinary Education’s New York City campus, said in an email. When heated, proteins in egg whites create a binding network of strands. That network prevents cookies, cakes, pasta, and meatloaf from crumbling apart.

For cakes, pancakes, and muffins, Ziata suggests using 1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce to replace each egg.

“Applesauce and other purees ... can help bind cakes that usually rely on one to three eggs for structure,” she said, but if it’s a recipe such as sponge cake that calls for eight eggs to leaven the cake, it isn’t going to work well.

“Bananas could be used in that capacity. too,” Marcus said. “One egg would be about 1/4 cup mashed banana.”

Unlike an egg, Crowley warned, fruits can also bring flavor changes and extra sweetness you may not want.

In tests for substitutions in box mix brownies, Crowley and her team found that 2 percent fat Greek yogurt was a “fabulous” egg replacement. “It was almost hard to tell the difference,” she said. Use 1/4 cup yogurt for each egg.

Greek yogurt and mayonnaise can stand in for eggs in fudgy brownies. fcafotodigital/Getty Images

Mayonnaise was another winner, in the right amount: “Three tablespoons of mayo for a boxed brownie mix was just right, while 1/4 cup made it greasy.” She also lists mayonnaise as a good fat substitute, especially in old-fashioned already-eggless dump-and-stir cakes such as depression cake.

Another alternative binder is a “flax egg,” made with ground flax seeds and water.

“Flax seeds are high in lignans, which are phytonutrients that release mucilage when heated, thus creating a gel,” Ziata said. For chewy cookies, brownies, bars, and scones, she uses 1 tablespoon ground flax seeds whisked with 3 tablespoons warm water for each egg. The mix needs to cool and gelatinize for a few minutes before you mix it into the batter.

Marcus prefers 2 tablespoons flax seeds for 3 tablespoons water.

“It’s a really good option for muffins and breads,” she said. “And it kind of lends a nuttier texture.” She sometimes even includes it if she does have eggs, just to give her children more nutrition and fiber.

For Meatballs and Meatloaf

Eggs are also a binding agent in meatballs or meatloaf, Marcus pointed out.

“You may like a sweeter meatball and you might want to use a banana,” she said, but most of us would probably choose the flax egg here.

Aquafaba is another good binder. It may sound like a lab trademark, but it means “bean water.” That viscous liquid contains all the starches pulled from the beans into the cooking water. You may have been dumping it down your sink every time you’ve drained a can of beans, but it makes an excellent egg substitute.

While most 15-ounce cans of beans come with about 1/2 cup aquafaba, we’re referring specifically to chickpeas, also known as garbanzo beans. Crowley and her crew tested other beans, but chickpeas performed the best for a neutral taste and consistently good starch content.

Note that aquafaba works well for binding meatballs, but may change the texture of baked goods. Crowley tried aquafaba in a brownie recipe and “it was definitely more of a cakey brownie than a dense, fudgy brownie,” she said.

Flax eggs and aquafaba work well as a binder in meatballs or meatloaf. Manuel Trinidad Mesa/Shutterstock

For Leavening and Whipping

“Eggs also act as a leavener for airy cakes like angel food and genoise,” Ziata said. In these foods, egg whites are whipped to trap air and help create a fluffy batter before the cake goes into the oven.

Baking soda and baking powder often do this in recipes, but adding more won’t help if the recipe already includes them. “You don’t want to increase baking soda or baking powder because you will taste it very quickly,” Ziata said. Too much of these leaveners can leave an awful bitterness or soapiness.

In some cases, Crowley says you can simply skip the egg: “You’re not going to be able to tell the difference,” she said. “For a denser pumpkin loaf, leaving out the egg or two might not significantly make a difference.” Boxed pancake mixes often call for eggs, but the dry ingredients themselves are already engineered for fluffy results.

But when you really need the fluff effect, aquafaba comes to the rescue. To replace whipped egg whites in a meringue, or to be folded into the batter of angel food cake or waffles, use two tablespoons of aquafaba for each egg white. For meringue, Marcus throws the aquafaba into an electric mixer with the whisk attachment, along with a bit of powdered sugar—“just like if you’re whipping cream,” she said. It whips up into the firm, fluffy peaks you’d want on a pie.

Ziata recommended a tip for whipping aquafaba (that also works for egg whites): Add a pinch of cream of tartar. This prevents the proteins from sticking together, thus stabilizing the tiny bubbles in the foam and speeding up the whipping process.

“You can make a wonderful whisky sour with aquafaba,” Ziata added.

Egg whites in cocktails and meringue are typically used raw, so unless you are using pasteurized eggs, the aquafaba has a food safety advantage as well.

Aquafaba, the starchy liquid in a can of chickpeas, is an excellent substitute for whole eggs or whipped egg whites. chris_tina/Shutterstock

For Egg Washes and Browning

Unwhipped aquafaba makes a good egg wash for certain breads and other recipes before they go into the oven. Brush it on just before baking “to get that really nice glossy texture,” Crowley said.

Mayo and dairy products such as milk, cream, butter, or yogurt also function as an egg wash. They provide a browning effect, though it won’t have the shine of eggs or aquafaba.

For Battering and Frying

Eggs also make the base for a good fry batter.

“If you’re using beaten eggs to help coat chicken or onion rings in breadcrumbs or flour before frying,” Ziata said, “you can try substituting with heavy cream or eggless mayonnaise, or make a beer or seltzer-based tempura batter instead.”

For Scrambling

It’s easier to hide an egg substitute in a baked product, but when you just want an omelet or a scramble, aquafaba or yogurt simply won’t fly.

For a scramble, Ziata recommends soy: “I love a tofu scramble with toast and avocado,” she said. Crush firm tofu and sauté it with onion, garlic, cumin, turmeric, and hot sauce. “You can add peppers or kale, too, to bulk it up even more.” The turmeric doesn’t just add flavor, but also brings additional health benefits and gives the mock eggs an appropriate yellow color.

Rather than an omelet or frittata, Ziata recommends making farinata, a savory pancake made from chickpea flour.

“You can cook in a nonstick pan like a pancake, fill it with vegetables and fold it into an omelet, or bake a thick batter in the oven with fillings mixed in like a frittata,” she said. She characterizes the flavor of chickpea flour as warm and toasty, creating a savory dish that lands between eggs and polenta, flavorwise.

But while we all, um, scramble to find egg alternatives, Crowley won’t overdo it.

“Maybe you buy a substitute … so you’re not going to bust out six eggs” for a recipe, she said. But where you really enjoy eggs for eggs, don’t cut that out. “I love eggs. I have one every morning. I’m not going to glug out something manufactured that actually probably costs more than eggs, even with them being so expensive.”