Has anyone used Stevia for baking?

Question

I use Stevia for sweetening my coffee instead of chemical sweeteners, and would like to use it for baking.Does anyone have experience using it? I would like to try it in a cake. If you have a recipe for a cake that would be great!

Answer 1

I don't use Stevia myself but I have done some baking with it (trying to come up with some goodies for diabetic friends). No browning, getting the right sweetness and flatter denser breads are the big problems in my experience. I have provided you a link to some Stevia recipies.

edit:
I didn't have much time earlier to go into detail but wanted to add that I never had much luck with adapting recipies to use Stevia instead of sugar. The best results I got were with cookies and brownies. Cakes I tried to make ended up like brownies. I feel guilty that I couldn't do more so I've done a big web search and came up with two cakes that seem to be decent. Here's one copied and the other is in the bottom link.

Stevia Recipe -1 : Carrot Cake
Ingredients

* 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut
* 180 g crushed pineapple with juice (240 g can)
* 1/2 cup butter or margarine (softened)
* 2 eggs beaten
* 1 teaspoon stevia extract
* 2 - 3 tablespoons fructose or date sugar
* 1/3 cup yogurt
* 60 ml milk
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 1/2 teaspoon maple flavouring
* 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
* 2 cups grated carrots
* 1 cup pastry flour
* 1 cup unbleached white flour
* 2 tablespoons soy flour
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
* 1/4 teaspoon salt


Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 175 deg C.
Oil a 25 cm x 15 cm cake pan.
Soak the coconut in the pineapple and juice.
Use all the juice from an 240g can of pineapple
but only 180 g of the pineapple. Set aside.
2. Soften and cream the butter (or margarine) in a large mixing bowl. Gradually cream in the beaten eggs (they need to be at room temperature). Don't worry if the butter separates. Add the stevia and fructose (or date sugar).
3. Thin the yogurt with the milk and add to the butter. Mix in the vanilla and maple flavoring. Stir in the walnuts, soaked coconut, pineapple and carrots.
4. Sift the flours, leavenings, cinnamon, and salt together twice in a separate bowl. Fold the sifted dry ingredients into the wet, stirring just until blended. Batter will be stiff.
5. Spoon batter into cake pan and bake for 1 hour. Cool in the pan.
6. Release the pan and top with cream cheese icing.

Good Luck!

Answer 2

3 cups water
4 cups flour
2 grams stevia

Mix well and bake.