What to use instead of 1 cup butter
1
1 cup solid coconut oil
Cream it like butter. Refined coconut oil has no coconut taste.
Best for: Cookies, pie crust, crumbles
2
¾ cup vegetable oil
Only for recipes that use melted butter.
Best for: Muffins, brownies, quick breads
3
1 cup plant-based butter sticks
Use sticks, not tubs, which contain more water.
Best for: Everything, dairy-free
Chef's tipSalted and unsalted butter swap 1 for 1; reduce added salt by about ¼ tsp per ½ cup of salted butter.
Substituting dairy
Dairy brings fat, moisture and sometimes acidity to a recipe. Full-fat versions of a substitute behave most like the original, and adding a dairy swap to a hot sauce off the heat helps stop it from splitting. For dairy-free cooking, unsweetened soy and oat milk are the most versatile all-rounders.
Need more or less than 1 cup butter? Scale the swap the same way as the original amount, or paste your recipe into the recipe converter to scale everything at once.
