If you are making a recipe that calls for vanilla pudding powder, but you don’t use it, here’s a handy swap.
Last year, we published this Meltaway Babka from Rivky Kleiman here on Between Carpools. It was a super popular recipe that both our readers (and us personally!) really enjoyed.
The recipe calls for a box of vanilla pudding powder, which is easy enough to find and add to recipes all year round, but on Pesach many people don’t use this ingredient, and even for those that do, it might not be something you have in your Pesach pantry when you want to make a recipe on a whim.
One reader, Malky, included a really helpful comment on that Babka post–this very handy recipe for a swap using ingredients we most certainly do have available.
Batya’s Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies also called for a package vanilla pudding, so it was time we made a batch to have ready for making both recipes.

Simply combine potato starch

with the sugar

and vanilla sugar.
Note that a box of pudding powder contains about 7-8 tbsp, so you would use a scant ½ cup of this mixture in your recipe when it calls for 1 package of pudding mix (approx. 3.2-3.5 oz).
Thank you Malky!
Homemade Pudding Powder
Ingredients
- 1 cup potato starch (as a Passover-friendly thickener)
- ½ cup cup sugar
- 1 tbsp vanilla sugar (you can also use kosher-for-Passover vanilla extract)
- pinch of salt
Instructions
- Simply combine potato starch with the sugar and vanilla sugar.
- This mix will help mimic the consistency and flavor of the commercial instant pudding mix. To use, simply combine it with the wet ingredients in your recipe and proceed as you would with the store-bought mix.
Notes



Can you also make chocolate pudding powder with this recipe? What would you add for that?
how much cocoa for chocolate pudding instead of vanilla to make this chumra friendly?