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Obviously, you can use powdered milk mixed with water to make milk for your recipes. The instructions for doing so are on the box. What if all you have is evaporated milk? How much water do you add to that to make regular milk?
Evaporated milk is milk that has had 60% of its water removed. But, you don’t have to worry about any confusing conversion formula. Evaporated milk is reconstituted by adding an equal amount of water. You use a 1 to 1 ratio.
Evaporated Milk Conversions for Varying Amounts of Milk
Evaporated milk comes in 5-ounce or 12-ounce cans. So, to reconstitute a whole can simply add 5 ounces or 12 ounces of water, depending on whether you have a small or large can. Five ounces is actually 5/8 cups. But hopefully, you have a glass measuring cup with ounce markers. Twelve ounces is 1.5 cups.
- 5-oz can evaporated milk + 5 ounces water = 10 oz or 1 1/4 cups of milk
- 12-oz can evaporated milk + 12 ounces water (1.5 cups) = 24 oz or 3 cups of milk
Otherwise, to reconstitute other amounts just use the same amount of water as evaporated milk. To make just any old amount of milk can get a bit weird. For instance, if you wanted to make exactly 3/4 cup of milk you’d need to use 3/8 cup each of evaporated and water. So, don’t do that. Just use easier to measure amounts and then measure out the amount of reconstituted milk you need.
- 1/2 cup milk = 1/4 cup evaporated + 1/4 cup water
- 1 cup milk = 1/2 cup evaporated + 1/2 cup water
I think you can figure it out from here!