How can I control ice crystal size in home made pure juice lollies

How can I control ice crystal size in home made pure juice lollies - Faceless man touching rough gems on crumpled fabric

With the recent hot weather we've been getting through so many Ice lollies (popsicles) that we have started making our own.

We are primarily using freshly squeezed orange juice (with bits *8') and freezing them in a frost free freezer regulated to -18°C.

Comparing them to the '100% juice' lollies we have been buying, they taste better but don't have quite the same texture when you bite into them.

In the commercial lollies, the ice crystals run in lines which radiate out from the central axis of each lolly. With our home frozen lollies, the ice crystals are randomly arranged in every orientation.

Answers to What stops commercial ice lollies from being rockhard? suggest changing the amount of sugar, or adding glycerin, pectin or gelatin.

I'm not sure whether adding more pectin would help, given that it's freshly squeezed orange juice that we're freezing, and the other suggestions aren't acceptable as we don't want to add any more sweeteners, and we want our lollies to be vegetarian, so no steak dipping here.

So, how do commercial freezers get this nice smooth, radiative arrangement of ice crystals without additives, and can I replicate this at home?

I presume that this is, in large part, a process control issue, with specific cooling profiles needed to get the ice crystals to form in a consistent way.

Steak Dipping: What my partner calls the act of needlessly making something non-vegetarian by adding something for which there is a vegetarian alternative.



Best Answer

I have been experimenting with vegan frozen desserts lately and I've found that using invert sugar and 0.5% to 1% locust bean gum really helps in slowing down the crystal formation.

I would hydrate LBG by combining with water and then bringing it to a boil while mixing; then mix it into the actual liquid you'd want to freeze.

Making invert sugar is also fairly easy, you can mix 1 tablespoon of lemon juice with 1kg water and 480ml water. And bring it to 114C under medium-high heat. Here's a recipe using citric acid instead




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Quick Answer about "How can I control ice crystal size in home made pure juice lollies"

By adding a tablespoon of corn syrup to the ingredients, she can slow down crystallization long enough to let her spoon up all the candies before they get grainy.

How do you prevent ice crystals in homemade popsicles?

Sweetener Options Adding sugar to the base mix will make your popsicles less of a block of ice and have a better texture. Adding a bit of corn syrup is good for avoiding pops that won't have too many ice crystals. All sugars work well to sweeten, from refined sugar through to honey and coconut sugar.

How do you make ice crystals smaller?

Once the ice cream's spun, work quickly to transfer it from the bowl and into the freezer as fast as possible. Freezing fast will help maintain the ice crystals' small size.

How do you keep homemade popsicles from getting hard?

6 Answers
  • Sugars may decrease the freezig point - add enough sugar and your ice remains soft-ish. ...
  • Alcohol has a low freezing point. ...
  • Glycerine (a sugar alcohol) helps keep ice cream soft.


  • Why are my popsicles not freezing?

    The liquid you're making pops with contains alcohol or if it's too high in fat, oil or sugar. The liquid you're making pops with is too soft or has too many solids. For example, if you made a chocolate pop from cocoa and used too high of a cocoa to water ratio, your pop may not freeze.



    Ice lolly recipe | Fruit popsicle | How to make ice lolly | Chachis Guide




    More answers regarding how can I control ice crystal size in home made pure juice lollies

    Answer 2

    Ice crystals for during the freezing process, but not once it's done.

    So you can either improve how cold you can get your freezing apparatus or increase the surface area of your pops, so that they get colder faster.

    Longer pops may help.

    Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

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