CONVERTERS AND CONVERSION CHARTS

Food Substitution Chart

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Australian cuisine has been shaped by the people who settled in Australia. For the majority of Australian history, food traditions were based on the native bush foods of indigenous Australians. British and Irish cooking came to Australia with the arrival of the settlers in the late 18th century. The 19th and 20th century immigrants from the Mediterranean and Asian culture had an influence on the Australia cuisine during this period.

Today food eaten by Aussies shows a world-wide influence and now includes organic and biodynamic, Kosher and Halal foods. British traditions are still dominant in takeaway foods as well as home cooking, with pies and fish and chips always popular with Aussies.

What? Food Confusion
An American was chatting with an Aussie on the Internet, when she said she had to stop to make her hungry son a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (also called P B & J). The confused Aussie said she had never heard of a "dessert" sandwich.

It took a while for the equally confused American to discover that jelly to Aussies is the same as Jello (gelatine) to her.

In other words, the Aussie wanted to know why her friend would want to eat a Jello and peanut butter sandwich.

The cultural differences in food can be quite entertaining. However, when you're trying to use a recipe from another country, it's nice to know what they're talking about. You'll find on this page some common cooking conversions.

Digestive Biscuits (Aussie)
Graham Crackers (USA)
These two items are fairly different, but are used similarly such as to make crumb crusts for a cheesecake.

In recipes calling for digestive biscuits, Americans and Canadians often use Graham Crackers as a substitute.

The sweeter graham crackers come in a variety of flavours like cinnamon and chocolate.

Digestive biscuits are richer, and while slightly sweet, are often eaten with cheese. They are also available coated on one side with milk or dark chocolate.

Cornflour (Australia)
Cornstarch (USA)
In Australia cornflour is frequently made from wheat and it is usually described as wheaten cornflour. There are some brands of cornflour that are made from maize, however.

Cornflower/cornstarch is used to thicken sauces. It has no taste of its own to interfere with your recipe. To use, blend it with double the amount of cold liquid. Stir it into the sauce to be thickened. Keep stirring as the mixture comes to a boil. It will thicken and become clear.

Fats

Cooking with fats can be rather tricky when you're substituting one for another. In general, you

Australian	American
Dairy
full-cream milk	whole milk
skim milk	skim or fat free or non-fat milk
Light or Lite milk	2% milk
cream, whipping	cream, heavy
cream, single	cream, half and half
Eggs, Meat & Fish
Balmain Bug	small, sweet crayfish
prawns	shrimp
king prawns	jumbo shrimp
banger	link sausage
minced beef	ground beef
mince	ground meat
Devon	bologna
skirt steak	flank steak
Fruit & Vegetables
spring onion	scallion
Spanish onion	onion, purple / red
shallots	scallions, green onions
capsicum (red, yellow, green)	bell pepper (red, yellow, green)
beetroot	round beets
chickpeas	garbanzos
rock melon	cantaloupe
sultanas	golden raisins
paw paw	papaya
Prepared Foods
gherkin	pickle
apple crumble	crisps
tomato sauce	ketchup or catsup
tomato puree	tomato sauce
gelatine or Aeroplane Jelly	gelatine or Jello
conserve	jelly
biscuits	cookies
scones	biscuits
Rice Bubbles	Rice Crispies
potato crisps	potato chips
chips	French fries
Icy Poles, Ice Blocks	popsicles
Baking and Baked Goods
flour, plain	flour, all-purpose
flour, self raising	flour, self-rising
flour, whole meal	flour, whole wheat
corn flour	cornstarch
bicarbonate of soda	baking soda
chillies	chilli pepper
essence	extract
vanilla essence	vanilla extract
zest, lemon, etc	zest or rind, lemon, etc
desiccated coconut	shredded, dried coconut
stock cubes	bullion cubes
copha *	vegetable shortening (Crisco)
Golden Syrup **	corn or cane syrup
molasses or treacle	molasses
icing sugar	powdered or confectioners sugar
caster sugar ***	sugar, granulated (but finer)
hundreds & thousands	sprinkles (closest equivalent)
chocolate, cooking	chocolate, baking
cocoa	cocoa powder
Baking Tools
baking tray	cookie sheet
oven slide	cookie sheet
cake cooler	wire rack
cake tin	baking pan
ring tin	tube pan
Swiss roll tin	jelly roll pan
Lamington tin	13" x 9" x 2" pan
greaseproof paper	wax paper
patty cups	paper cupcake holders
tea towel	dish towel
trolley	shopping cart
griller (separate from oven)	broiler (inside oven)

can substitute butter for shortening. For most things that substitution works for me, however, in a bickies recipe I have, it didn't work. They were runny when baked and looked awful. Luckily they tasted good, but not good enough to serve to anyone. I'm still working on that recipe.

Shortening is a white, solid fat made from vegetable oil. (If you see a recipe calling for Crisco, they're talking about shortening.) You'll find it a common ingredient in US cooking, used for frying, cakes, pastry and frostings as well as other things.

* Copra is a solid fat made from coconuts. While some people use lard as a replacement, you might want to try shortening instead for a healthier alternative.

Sugar and Other Sweeteners

Always remember, while a certain substitute might work fine for one recipe, it may not for another. So always test a recipe before using it for an important event. Or try it on a friend who has a good sense of humour and loves an adventure.

** Golden syrup is similar to corn syrup in the USA. For a sweet flavour choose light corn syrup and for a slightly molasses flavour choose dark corn syrup. (If you see a recipe calling for Karo, they're talking about corn syrup in the US.) You'll need to experiment to find which type of corn syrup works for the particular recipe you're trying.

*** Caster sugar is a bit finer than granulated sugar in the USA. The only thing that's about as close in the US is superfine sugar. However, for most recipes you can use caster sugar for granulated sugar.

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