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My wife's standard approach to any cake or confectionary recipe is to immediately half the listed quantity of sugar. Apparently this is common amongst pastry-c
by dingaling 10y ago
My wife's standard approach to any cake or confectionary recipe is to immediately half the listed quantity of sugar. Apparently this is common amongst pastry-chefs in catering and doesn't appear to affect the final result other than being a bit paler after cooking.
We even made half-sugar doughnuts recently which were still delicious ( no topping or filling needed ).
So I reckon Nestle will just produce a slightly less bulky confectionery, for the same price of course.
- Xcelerate 10y agoWhat if the recipe doubled the required amount of sugar in anticipation of people cutting the amount they add?
- bennyg 10y agoIt's more likely that a greater amount of people use the recipe as-is, instead of halving. My guess is the recipes aren't playing reverse-psychology with cooks.
- debacle 10y agoSugar can change the texture greatly of cakes especially. I do the same thing that you do, but it does have an impact on the mouth feel.
- mc32 10y agoWhen I bake at home I do the same thing. I'm still a bit hit or miss with regard to having things come out with the same texture/feel (how they rise or not, etc.) My basic question is how to compensate for the proportions new proportions. But overall, the taste is much more palatable because there is much less sugar-shock.
- notalaser 10y agoMe and my girlfriend (we both really, really like cooking) do that with a lot of recipes that involve sugar. It does affect the texture, but I think it often improves the taste. There are things that ought to be sugary (like thick syrups used for preserving), but most pastries, jams, jellies and deserts in general need surprisingly less sugar than recent cookbooks would imply. Adding just enough sugar to take the edge off of bitterness or sourness ends up being more rewarding than cramming everything full of sugar to the point where all you feel is something odd next to the sweetness.
- gnopgnip 10y agoThere are safety concerns when changing any recipe that will be preserved. The sugar in jams and jellies also acts as a preservative after they are opened.
- matt-attack 10y agoCurious how sugar is a preservative? I would have thought it was food for bacteria.
- rdoherty 10y agoI believe sugar is a preservative because it's hygroscopic. http://www.sciencefocus.com/qa/how-does-sugar-act-preservative http://www.sciencefocus.com/qa/how-does-sugar-act-preservati...
- AstralStorm 10y agoOsmotic effect on cell walls. Does not matter for chocolate or already dry pastries.
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- gambiting 10y agoHoney is pretty much nothing but sugar yet absolutely no bacteria can grow in it - there's basically a point where there's too much of it.
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- caf 10y agoHoney also contains a small amount of hydrogen peroxide.
- 3pt14159 10y agoI remove 75% of the sugar from cookies. It's crazy how little you notice the reduced sugar.
- webkike 10y agoI think it's also one of those things where the less sugar you eat the more pronounced it tasted. Anecdotally, everything in Champaign IL tastes way sweeter after vacationing back home in Palo Alto where we rarely consume corn syrup or excess sweeteners
- thomnottom 10y agoAfter having drastically reduced my sugar intake, I can't even stomach most sodas. It's startling how big of a difference it can make.
- brokenmachine 10y agoI'm the same, I can't even touch soda, it's way too sweet. Orange juice tastes like sickly sweet syrup to me nowadays as well.
- ThomPete 10y agoAlso sugar, like salt and chili are all ingredients where you can adjust how much you need if you don't do it too often. I.e. if you don't eat a lot of sugar it doesn't take a lot of sugar for you to feel satisfied by the sweetness, and vice versa if you eat a lot you need more and more (which is a huge problem with sugar in alot of food today) Same thing goes with salt and chili.
- malka 10y agoAnd drugs
- wlievens 10y agoAnd Factorio for that matter
- haneefmubarak 10y agoNah, if you don't watch out in the early to middle stages, things can quickly get out of hand...
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- sevensor 10y agoI do this for hot chocolate: double the cocoa powder and half the sugar from what it says on the box. Whisk with whole milk, and enjoy an incredibly rich chocolate flavor.
- herbst 10y agoPutting extra sugar in hot chocolate. That one is actually new to me.
- jamessb 10y agoThere's a difference between 'instant hot chocolate' powder (which is sweetened), and 'cocoa powder' (typically unsweetened, and quite bitter unless sugar is added).
- herbst 10y agoOk i would not call that hot chocolate, therefore the confusion. (Freely translated that would be simply called cocoa drink)
- danudey 10y agoI have a Taiwanese friend who says that she always halves the amount of sugar in any western recipe she makes so that it's palatable, since she hasn't grown up eating the over-sweetened garbage food that a lot of Western kids grew up with.
- edblarney 10y agoAnyone making food from 'recipes' in the West is likely not eating 'garbage'. Though we do eat 'too much sugar' - the 'garbage' I suggest is really over-processed, too much hydrogenated oil etc. etc.. Anyone that made their diet out of things 'they cooked themselves' could very well use the recipes as they are and do pretty well. Most dinner dishes do not even call for sugar. Mostly only cakes and what-not. Maybe muffins are a culprit? :)
- wlievens 10y agoThe entire conversation here is about cakes and pastry. No sensible 'Western' recipe tells you add spoons of sugar to a steak or a mushroom soup.
- leesalminen 10y agoHave you not tried milk steak with raw jelly beans? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZfCyTpAlg8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZfCyTpAlg8
- hugi 10y agoIcelander here. We generally do this for American recipes, European recipes are usually not as sweet.
- Camillo 10y agoI wish Americans would stop assuming their issues are universal to the West. Excessive sugar in recipes is a specifically American problem. I grew up in Europe, and the difference is huge.
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- deathanatos 10y agoI regularly do this with the amount of butter that Kraft thinks mac and cheese requires, often by at least 25%…
- cstrahan 10y agoIn general, I'd recommend against cutting the butter; not only is it delicious, but it also provides a nice dose of cholesterol - gotta keep those androgens high[1]. I'd argue that butter is the only healthy component of mac and cheese, so most people (excepting those with particular dietary needs) might as well keep it in and enjoy increased muscle mass[2] and a leaner body composition[3]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testosterone#Biosynthesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testosterone#Biosynthesis 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen#Muscle_mass https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen#Muscle_mass 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen#Inhibition_of_fat_deposition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Androgen#Inhibition_of_fat_dep...
- atomical 10y agoThe body produces cholesterol. I've never heard of someone being diagnosed with low cholesterol. Usually it's a good thing.
- ericd 10y agoYou're conflating dietary and blood cholesterol, which are completely different things. Eating lots of cholesterol does not give you high blood cholesterol.
- russellsprouts 10y agoI agree. I make 3 boxes at once. The box calls for 1.5 sticks of butter in that case, but I only use 1, and it comes out great.
- OJFord 10y agoHad to Google 'sticks of butter', crazy Americans ;) I also don't understand what Kraft is doing you telling you how to make macaroni cheese... What's in a 'Kraft mac and cheese' box that it still requires making, and yet is also some kind of recipe kit? It's hardly a complex recipe from 'scratch' (eg http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8834/bestever-macaroni-cheese http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8834/bestever-macaroni-ch...).
- mrfusion 10y agoWould this work for cheesecake? I love the texture but hate the excessive sweetness. Maybe this would be a solution.
- radicalbyte 10y agoYeah, just google for some of the high protein recipes.
- Uhhrrr 10y agoI tend to do this with a lot of cocktail books. Dale Degroff, for example, is a great writer but man does he like 'em sweet.
- rawfan 10y agoMy wife used to work in the hottest pastrie place in our city. The stuff there was totally amazing. It tasted great but not too sweet and it even felt so "light" that you'd always thing "why not have a second, third or fourth piece?" When she quit she stole the recipes so that we could make this awesome stuff at home. Besides some really cool secret ingredients the only difference between home recipes and "best cake in town" was that the used AT LEAST twice the amount of sugar, eggs and cream than I've ever seen in any recipe. Edit: As others mentioned. There seems to be a huge difference between Europe and USA. So these are European recipes. ;)
- dghughes 10y agoBack in 2008 Hershey's had to stop using the term milk chocolate it had to use "chocolate candy" because they started using cheaper ingredients. I guess they'll change again to this weird sugar to save on the formerly cheap ingredients. http://www.today.com/food/chocoholics-sour-new-hersheys-formula-2D80555560#.UilF7htvOyk http://www.today.com/food/chocoholics-sour-new-hersheys-form... I used to like Lindt and was disappointed to see they use palm oil in their chocolate instead of cocoa butter. Even worse is palm oil plantations are made by cutting down forests and displacing endangered animal species.
- herbst 10y agoLind is like the cheap, mass produced and not so tasty variant of swiss chocolate anyway. Still exactly what most tourists are buying ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- ido 10y agoSo what's the good kind?
- herbst 10y agoDepending on where you are it is likely you cant get it or only in specialized shops :/ But a few wider spread brands to look for: * Camille Bloch * Munz * Cailler And if you ever are in Switzerland make sure to stop by a Läderach
- ido 10y agoI live in Germany so there's a good selection of chocolate around* :) I'll keep an eye out for these! * coincidentally, just a few minutes walk from the Rausch factory, where we usually buy our chocolates.
- herbst 10y agoYeah germany should work :) Really each one really worth it, i am from austria originally and i cant eat anything than swiss chocolate anymore after a few years there. But given Rausch is absolutely awesome too!