Last weekend, we made buttermilk pancakes, which were so delicious we made another batch. Unfortunately, we were all out of buttermilk by this stage, but my sister said it was easily resolved – we could just add lemon juice to the mixture. Well, this didn’t turn out to be true, as the taste was considerably different. She maintains lemon juice should have worked. Is she right?
Yes and no. Lemon juice can be added to sour the milk slightly, to give it a taste similar to buttermilk, but it’s not just a case of throwing it into your mixture at any old stage. You won’t get quite the same result as actual buttermilk, but you can get close to it by using lemon juice.
Add 1 tablespoon of fresh lemon juice to a cup of milk, stir, and let it sit for two minutes. Your milk should be acidic and curdled by that point, and can then be added to your recipe as per normal. Alternatively, you can use yoghurt or cream of tartar as substitutes. It’s hard to beat the real thing, though.
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