Go to the Recipe: Beet Fluid Gel
Thanks for this. As far as I can tell I'm using 100% juice without acid, but the pH is just under 4 without the balsamic, and simply won't set. I've remade it today with Agar (at 4g) and had much more success. It certainly isn't perfect but at least I'm getting a set now. I would think despite the mouth feel issue, this might be better for this kind of gel where the pH is at the edge of what the Gellan can cope with. Hexametaphosphate would be good, but I wouldn't have thought it would be much more effective than regulating with sodium citrate? It's also harder for me to get here in the UK, but I may need to put in an order soon anyway!
I also find that larger batches of fluid gels are a better blending experience and I also do not use xanthan in fluid gels, and sheer the gum directly into the blender full of hot seasoned clarified juice. It is more streamlined to sheer the gums into a blender rather than the stovetop. Add hot seasoned liquid to blender and start the vortex, add gums. Boil in blender and be careful!. Pour out into shallow dish to set to a firm brick. Blend, pass, vacuum out air. I have more success this way than the stovetop dispersal and hydration.
Does that beetroot juice have acid? You can always add a pinch of sodium hexametaphosphate as a sequestrate to regulate acidity. Or make the fluid gel without adding balsamic until you sheer gel brick. This way the gel can set and hydrate properly. Ph is always a factor when making fluid gels. Fresh juice that you clarify yourself is always best.
I have been completely unable to get this to set and wonder if anyone has any thoughts. I used up to 8g of Gellan to try and get a set but have had no success. I've been using store-bought beetroot juice as I don't have a juicer and have tried 2 different balsamic vinegars. I have tried hydrating for both short and long time periods. My guess is that this is still too acidic to gel, so I tried a 5g addition of sodium citrate to try and buffer the pH but still to no avail. I've now spent a fortune on beetroot juice but can't get this to work. I'll try agar which has less pH dependency, but I'm pretty thoroughly broken by this recipe. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
If this is after the gellan has been added, and brought to a boil, then cooled. I would assume two things:
A. You need to hydrate the gum more let it simmer for another 30 seconds or so- if fully hydrated, it should set to a brittle brick
B. The balsamic you are using might be a higher PH than what was used to develop this recipe and yes i would increase the Gellan by 50%
let us know if that helps
Nice and thick but it doesn’t gel, even if I increase the Gellan by 50%. Any ideas?
Multivac
What brand of vacuum chamber are you using?
Maybe the blowtorch method? It won't be perfect.
Hi ChefSteps, this is Alexander and I was just wondering if there is any other way you can remove the air from fluid gels if you don't have a vacuum chamber to use at home?
You should be good at 1% of the total weight.
I tried this recipe with 1:1 LT100 Gellan Gum. It never got very liquidy after blending. It still had a brittle gelatinous texture. Perhaps using less LT100 might work?
Sorry Barbara, but they react in very different ways and are not swappable. And to clarify, this activity is asking you to use the low acyl glean not the high. low acyl creates a more brittle brick that can be sheared into a fluid Gell, high will result in more of a gelatin type brick that will not blend to a nice fluid gel.
Can I use the same quantity of low acyl gellan gum instead
of the high acyl?
can i use agar in place the kelcogel?
sure can
Can I use bottled beet juice (Biota 100% beet juice lactose-fermented) instead of doing my own? Don't have a powerful juicer and this approach seems much easier.
It's possible you lost more liquid to evaporation than they did. LAGG is really powerful stuff, so the texture could easily firm up if left heating for too long.
Hi there,
I am planning on making a sweet raspberry fluid gel but I am confused as to what people mean when they say base liquid. Is this just the flavoured liquid you are gelling or does sugar count as base liquid also?
Thankyou!!
Someone got a nice idea how to combine kohlrabi juice to get a nice tasty result? And is it necessary to add some color stabilising nutrition when using kohlrabi? Thanks in Advance
@Claudia Gaby You're going to want about 0.5% to 2.0% agar to fluid. procedure is just about identical. consistency would be just about identical.
Hi, I was wondering if I'm trying to replace the gellan gum with agar-agar, will the consistency be the same? Will there be any difference in procedure? And lastly, will the ratio of liquid to agar-agar be the same as to gellan and water? Thank you!
As my garden comes in to the end of fall, I have a lot (I mean probably 1,000 each) of different colored beets and carrots that I need to prepare for storage. Everything can not be pickles...I am thinking of juicing a lot of them and putting them in vacuum bags and freezing them. If I do this, can I then thaw the juice and proceed with the recipes for fluid gels, risottos, etc? Thanks.
I don't have a # 120, can I use a # 200 sieve instead?
Would popping it in a siphon, charging it & then clearing the charge also work?
Blend and pectinase?
Why not use ultratex?
Why not just use ultra?
Yes, I love to juice a roasted beet. Gives it a mild smoked flavor.
yeah beet size can vary a lot. here in Germany they come in sizes from golfball to softball.
Can you juice cooked beets? Would love to use this with a beet dish where there is some beet trimming taking place after they roast (easier to cut). I wonder if the turnout is similar.
I made this yesterday and it came out perfect! In the ingredients you say 15 beets but I got more than 400 ml with just 5 beets.
how much agar should i use if im using that in place of gellan?
I used 400g pomegranate juice, 4 g Kelcogen F, 4 g sugar and .4 g xanthan gum, heated to 203 degrees. When reheated, the gel loses its shape, but is still thick. Is that what's supposed to happen? Trying to understand hot applications for this.
Hi There!
I scaled the recipe carefully and followed instructions, but my gel turned out somewhat dry and course. I reblended, adding an additional 70g of beet juice, which improved the quality immensely. I wonder where I went wrong. I checked and double checked each scaling to be sure. I've made a lot of agar gels, but never used Kelcogel F until today. I brought it to around 209 F before I pulled it, but didn't think that would have a hug impact. Any ideas? I should note that the 15 beets I juiced, ranging from golf ball to 1/2 pounders, yielded approx 750g of juice.
How important is the Sieve size? I'm just starting to experiment and I can't quite justify several hundred dollars in several sieve sizes. Would a #80 work well for most of these applications? If not, what should be the 'first' tamis to buy? Thanks!
Tapping, resting, tamis.
Hi Chris, Finally got around to trying this today (late I know). I was very impressed with the luxurious texture. Not that agar is bad by any means, but it simply does not have the same......luxurious mouthfeel at all. Wow. I am impressed with the difference Thank you again. Will play with adding to it to create a mousse as well.
any way of removing some air if you do not own a vacuum chamber
What happens if I use High Acyl Gellan in this recipe? Would I be better off using Agar Agar?
Also, sodium benzoate or bisulfate at .1%
Ascorbic acid and blanch then chip very fast.
any thoughts on how to keep an asparagus fluid gel green?(citric acid)?
What options do I have if I don't own a juicer. I own a chamber vac but no juicer yet. Any thoughts?
Try charging some of the beet gel in a siphon (2 charge), you'll end up with a beautiful red hue.
- originally posted by Pepijn
You need to get the gelatin above about 40 °C for a while to fully melt the gelatin. But you can make it work the way you describe.
Is there any reason you couldn't use gelatin sheets after the liquid has been boiled and comes down to a lower temperature that would only melt the gelatin rather than cook it? If it's going to be served cold anyway I assume it's possible, but would like to know the temperature at which to add it, and the difference, if any, in mouthfeel or flavor.
Thanks Chris Young ! Really helpful! Love the great work on this site. It's the biggest influence and inspiration on my cooking.
It depends on how much pulp is in your juice. If there is a lot, I would recommend sieving the juice. It will make your life easier when you go to sieve the fluid gel.
Is there a reason to sieve the juice if you're just going to end up sieving the fluid gel?
You're welcome. Interested to see how you like the results from gellan.
Try reducing the amount of agar is one suggestion. But I often force the solid jelly through a sieve rather than try to blend it.
This technique with agar is one of my favorites. I would recommend trying to dice the gel that has formed prior to the prior blend. My (limited) experience is this reduces the amount of agitation necessary. Chris Young thank you for he commentary on Gellan. I hadn't heard or read about the difference in mouthfeel and up to now, didn't know why some prefer the gellan. Will give it a try to see if I notice the difference in mouth-feel and flow. so many mini-experiments. :-) Thanks again.
Hey Chris Young, I attempted to make a fluid gel recently with tomato water and agar. I hydrated the agar into half of the tomato water and combined, set in a mold and into the fridge. Instead of using your technique here of chilling and mixing over an ice bowl, what I ended up from the fridge was a solid slab of tomato jelly.When I subsequently blended it, the jelly was dry and couldnt blend well, and would only become a fluid gel with the addition of some water. Was I doing it wrong?
Gellan tends to have much better flavor release compared to agar, and we prefer the mouthfeel of gellan over agar. But if agar is what you have, then use that, it will work. Xanthan tends to help with syneresis, but also just gives it a bit of a different flowing texture that we like over a pure fluid-gel in this case.
I've made fluid gels with agar, the process is exactly the same, is there a benefit of using gellan over agar? and is the addition of xantham to prevent syneresis or does it affect texture?
