🍕🧪 Tastes Like Science
10th edition - Gummy Worms, Fresh vs Frozen Fruit, and FRUIT SEASON
WE MADE IT TO FRIDAY AND IT'S THE 10TH EDITION LET'S GOOOOOOO!
First things first, the winner of the Peugeot Mortar and Pestle from last week's giveaway is...
! Congratulations, look for an email from me asking for shipping details.Hard to believe the newsletter has been going strong for 10 weeks straight! Thank you so much to all of you that have been reading, supporting, everything.
Even though I'm on time this week, I'd like to celebrate with another giveaway (y'all are spoiled). This week it'll be this brand new 8" Chef's Knife from Hedley & Bennett. To win, like the post and leave a comment with what your death row meal would be and why! (must be a newsletter subscriber and US only)
Let's get into it!
This week's challenge was to make homemade sour gummy worms. Now, I would not consider myself to be an expert at many things. But gummy candy is one of them. I've tried pretty much every brand on the market and I make it a mission to find new ones when I travel. So I'm super excited to be trying it for the first time.
The recipe itself was pretty straight forward, but you will need some specialty items: a silicone candy mold, gelatin, and citric and/or malic acid. Now, all you really have to do here is make a fruit puree with whatever you want, I used strawberries and mangoes. Then heat the puree and mix in gelatin and use the mixture to fill in the mold. After cooling overnight, toss in your sour mixture (I used a ratio or 15:1:1 sugar:citric:malic).
At the time of writing this, they’ve been coating with the sour sugar but still need an overnight rest at room temperature to fully dry out the gelatin. I did taste test a few and the texture is similar to jello but the taste is promising! You’ll have to watch my video coming out this weekend to see the results :)
NEXT WEEK:
My favorite food to get a bar is a pretzel with beer cheese, so let's make it for the first time. To make it interesting, I'm going to be using lye, a (safe but somewhat dangerous) mixture of water and sodium hydroxide which helps brown the crust.
When I first came up with The Weekly Taste Test segment, I always envisioned it being more of a weekend project that I could participate in with viewers. The next few editions will be recipes that are slightly more challenging or interesting, rather than focusing on specific techniques or ingredients. If you participate and send me a picture of your dish, I’ll feature you!
🧊🍓 Why Can You Tell the Difference Between Fresh and Frozen Fruit?
The Science:
When fruit freezes, ice crystals form inside the cells. These crystals puncture and rupture the cell walls, damaging the fruit's structure. Once thawed, the water leaks out, leaving fruit softer, mushier, and sometimes watery.
That’s why frozen fruit often feels limp compared to crisp, juicy fresh fruit—it's not about flavor, but texture. Some fruits with higher water content, like strawberries, show this more dramatically.
Actionable Tips:
Use frozen fruit for smoothies, baking, or jams where texture matters less when blended or cooked.
For crisp toppings like fruit salads, fresh is best.
Partially thaw frozen fruit for firmer texture in yogurt bowls or oatmeal.
IT'S FRUIT SEASON BABY! While there are many other great fruit throughout the year, I think it's pretty widely agreed upon that this is the fruit PRIME TIME. Personally, I'm gonna be devouring a watermelon a week. Make sure you go and enjoy some berries, cherries, mangoes, nectarines, and the whole shabang for the next few months.
Get yourself a bain marie. They're tall stainless containers that hold your utensils while cooking. I typically fill mine about half way up with a little water to rinse my utensils between uses. I used to use a spoon rest, but for the last year this has been my preferred method for storing utensils while cooking.
I wanna give a shoutout to Michael Tchao, a fellow food creator on Instagram. I first spoke with him early in my content creation journey and I finally got the chance to meet him in person last week! If you love my content, you'll love his as well. Food science, recipes centered around health, and some other fun new projects from him recently. Check him out!
Thanks for reading— Hope to hear from you and see you next week!
*If you’d like to read more of the Tastes Like Science Newsletter, you can read previous editions on my SubStack.
It's weird to me reading about a "fruit season" because as a Colombian, we don't have a season per se, as we have them all year round. It makes me feel grateful to live here!
As a death row meal, I'd ask for a good tagliatelle al ragu with lots of cheese and a tiramisu as a dessert.
Death row meal is Terry Black's bbq in texas. Give me a whole plate of brisket, jalapeno sausage, baked beans, and green beans while I'm laying on my hospital bed.