Of course! Not that it's the same, but that you could have melted the solid Crisco. Personally, I use a little butter.

Of course, that is what in days gone by we would use. I still would use it if I ran out of what I normally use. I like my pancakes fried in butter or bacon grease too!

Sue

Another bacon grease lover here. But I only use it for pancakes, because of what Nicole said. Life's too short never to have bacon.

Crisco (solid shortening) in the can is supposed to perform differently than oil when used in baking. Oil is used in cakes but seldom will you see it in other baked goods.

Cookies baked with shortening,butter or margarine will spread differently, sometimes brown differently and have a different "crumb" or tenderness from one another. Same for pie crust. The old cookies that called for shortening instead of butter did so for a reason. It was not just because shortening was less expensive. Grandma's recipes will be OK with butter but they will be different, especially in mouth feel.

But with the removal of trans fat from Crisco and the like this has all changed. It is simply not possible to make a good non greasy and heat stable buttercream without trans fats at this time. A lot of bakers are working on a solution. But so far nothing perfors like a good trans fat laden hi ratio shortening. Trans fats both in the shortening and the fudge base kept it from slippage, weepage and that awful greasy mouth feel that gives cheap buttercream such a bad name. You can make good tasting buttercream but forget picnics. No more outdoor cakes in warm weather. I have stopped decorating cakes for this reason. Only cakes that can be kept chilled or in air conditioned rooms do I now do for family. DD feels the same. May as well buy a Costco cake which are actually not bad for what they are. Pastry Pride/Bettercreme (sort of like a fancied up cool whip product that can be flavored) is used by many bakers these days. If you look around you will see not many stores have buttercream cakes and cupcakes left out of the cooler. If you find them they are nasty in texture and flavor.

True margarine has been hard to find for years. They have added so much water to it it has to be called spread.

They are definitely not interchangeable. A friend was putting together a Halloween costume that called for his hair to be slicked back, but didn't have any mousse or hair gel. Someone suggested using Crisco as a last minute, last ditch substitute, meaning, of course, the solid shortening. He didn't have that, and wasn't even familiar with it, so he used Crisco vegetable oil, which didn't work very well, and he had rivulets of oil dripping down his face and neck all evening. :-)