What is the texture of cakes when baking soda is added instead of baking powder
Answers
Baking powder is actually baking soda but with added acid. Usually, these two are used in order to caused baked goods to rise, and this occurs because when you add an acid to sodium bicarbonate, it causes an acid-base reaction to occur, which makes the sodium bicarbonate to disassociate usually into water and carbon dioxide, and it's the carbon dioxide which then causes those air bubbles to form, and for your baked goods to rise. This means that if in your cake recipie there is the prevelance of an acid, then it probably will have the same effect if you use baking soda instead of baking powder, such as in a chocolate cake, because both chocolate and cocoa powder are acidic. However, if you're making something such as a vanilla cake, there isn't any acid to react with the alkalinc baking soda, ergo, no air bubbles will form. So in turn, if your recipie includes something heavily acidic, it doesn't matter much if you use baking soda instead of powder, but if it doesn't, you do have to use baking powder.