Malted milk powder rewards a little know-how: how to choose it, cook it, store it, and substitute in a pinch. Browse 16 recipes to cook with it.

What is malted milk powder?

Malted milk powder is the ingredient behind that nostalgic soda-fountain flavor: the toasty, slightly nutty sweetness of an old-fashioned malted milkshake. It is a fine tan powder made from malted barley, wheat flour, and powdered milk, evaporated together into a shelf-stable blend.

The malt is the difference. Malted barley is grain that has been sprouted and dried, which develops a deep, biscuity, caramel-toast flavor that plain dairy never has.

That single note is the whole appeal. It reads as malt first, sweet dairy second, with a richness that makes ice cream taste creamier and cookies taste more interesting.

Do not confuse it with plain dry milk powder, which is just dehydrated milk with no malt and no toasty flavor. The two are not interchangeable when the malt is the point.

Cooking and Baking With Malt Powder

The classic use is a drink. A few tablespoons whisked into milk and blended with vanilla ice cream is what turns a plain milkshake into a malted, and stirred into warm milk it makes an Ovaltine-style nightcap.

It earns its keep in baking, where it does two jobs at once. The malt adds flavor, and the milk solids and sugars help things brown and tenderize.

In cookies it is transformative. Best Malted Milk Cookies and Chocolate Malted Cookies both lean on it for a chewy texture and a flavor that tastes like more than vanilla and chocolate.

It does the same in cakes, carrying the malt through an Always Welcome Chocolate Malt Cake or a Malted Coconut Marble Cake.

Frozen desserts love it. It flavors the cookies and the filling in Chocolate Malt Ice Cream Sandwiches and gives a soft-set body to a Chocolate Malted Ice Box Pudding.

A spoonful also belongs in batters and doughs. Worked into a yeast dough like No Knead Bran Bread, it adds a faint sweetness and helps the crust color to a deeper brown.

The same trick lifts a stack of waffles or pancakes, deepening both the flavor and the golden color.

Pairing and Common Mistakes

Malt and chocolate are the great pairing, which is why so many malted recipes are chocolate ones. It also flatters vanilla, coffee, caramel, banana, peanut butter, and toasted nuts, all flavors that sit in the same warm, toasty family.

The most common mistake is reaching for the wrong powder. A recipe that says malted milk powder will fall flat with plain dry milk, and a chocolate malt powder like Ovaltine adds cocoa and extra sugar the recipe did not plan for.

Use plain malted milk powder unless a recipe names the chocolate kind.

The other slip is dumping it into a cold drink and fighting lumps. It clumps in cold liquid, so whisk it into a little warm milk or blend it with the ice cream rather than stirring it into a finished cold glass.

Substitutes for Malted Milk Powder

No swap truly matches it, because the malt flavor is the whole reason to use it. For the closest match in a drink, Ovaltine or another chocolate malt powder works if you cut the recipe's sugar and cocoa to account for what it already contains.

For baking, plain diastatic or non-diastatic malt powder gives you the malt flavor without the dairy, so add a tablespoon of dry milk powder alongside it to make up the milk solids.

If you only need the body and browning and can live without the malt, plain dry milk powder is the fallback, measure for measure, knowing you lose the toasty flavor entirely.

In a pinch, a spoonful of barley malt syrup brings the malt taste. It is liquid, so reduce the recipe's other sweet liquid a little to compensate.

Buying and Storing Malted Milk Powder

You will find it in the baking aisle near the powdered milk and hot-drink mixes, often under the Carnation or King Arthur labels. Check that you are buying plain malted milk powder, not the chocolate malted drink mix sold a shelf over, unless that is what you want.

Because it contains milk solids and fat, it is more perishable than you might expect for a dry powder. Keep it in an airtight container in a cool, dark cupboard, where an unopened jar keeps well past a year.

Once opened, use it within about six months for the best flavor and seal it tightly between uses, since it readily absorbs moisture and humidity will turn it into a hard, clumped brick. Storing it in the fridge or freezer extends its life if you bake with it only occasionally.

Quick facts

In Chinese

麦乳精粉

British (UK) term

Malted milk powder

en français

poudre de lait malté

en español

polvo de leche malteada

Recipes using malted milk powder

There are 16 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 16 recipes