[Sca-cooks] baking powder

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Margaret Rendell:
>Now I'm confused.
>
>I've managed to delete the original post, but there was a reference to
>'single-' and 'double-acting' baking powder.
>
>I've only ever seen one sort of thing marketed here (Lochac) as "Baking
>powder"...bicarb. soda plus a phosphate aerator, plus a filler, usually
>rice flour. Four teaspoons of it make a pound of plain flour into a
>pound of self-raising flour. Is this 'double-action', and bicarb. alone
>'single-action'?

Double-acting baking powder provides a lift when you first mix it (as
does single-acting; both contain bicarb plus, I think, some kind of
ammonia salt), and then, again, when you heat the mixture. It just
reacts at two different temperatures, is all, and provides a bit of a
safety net.

Adamantius