Lollipops are unpretentious sweets that are well known to everyone from an early age. After all, no children's holiday is complete without sweets. And although today everyone is well aware of the dangers of all kinds of candies and other goodies, which contain sugar, it is simply impossible to completely refuse them. And for children, sweets are at all an integral part of the daily diet.
A few words about the treat
But do you know that such a treat can also be useful? In fact, this is so - lollipops prepared at home may well be completely harmless. What is the most harmful in industrial sweets? First, of course, a huge amount of sugar and its artificial substitutes. And today everyone knows about the consequences of consuming it in too large doses.
In addition to sugar, these flavors include a variety of flavors, flavor enhancers and colorings. As you understand, there is nothing useful among the listed components. In other words, to make absolutely harmless sweets you just need to do without the described ingredients. A simple sugar-free candy recipe will help you. In addition, children with allergies to factory sweets can be pampered with such sweets.
Features
As already mentioned, you can make delicious candy without sugar. Making such treats with your own hands is not difficult at all. And the usual sugar in the composition of this treat can be replaced by a wide variety of sweeteners. For example, the proposed homemade candy recipe uses agave syrup instead.
Among domestic culinary specialists, this product is little known, but its popularity is gradually gaining momentum. And not in vain, because agave syrup has a lower calorie content and glycemic index, compared with sugar. Thanks to these properties, such a sweetener can easily become part of a healthy diet.
True, it is worth considering that this syrup is more than half composed of fructose, which should not be consumed too often. So even homemade sugar-free candies should be a rare treat on your menu if, of course, you monitor your health.
Essential Ingredients
So, to make tasty and healthy sweets you will need:
- 200 ml agave syrup;
- 70 ml of water;
- tartar on the tip of a knife;
- a teaspoon of vanilla extract;
- 10 ml of vegetable oil;
- 3 g liquid stevia.
From the indicated amount of ingredients, you will get about 16-17 candies. You will need about an hour and a half to complete the process.
How to make candy
For the manufacture of homemade sweets, you can use special cookie cutters or small blanks for muffins. You can make candies even in the most ordinary spoons by placing sticks in them in advance.
So, first of all, prepare the selected molds, lubricating them with vegetable oil. It is desirable that it be free from any odors, so that the candies do not get a specific aftertaste or aroma. Better yet, use confectionery oil in the form of a spray - this way you can achieve the thinnest layer in molds, without surplus.
In a small saucepan, mix water with agave syrup. Put the container on the stove, choosing medium power, bring the mixture to a boil. Now send the tartar into it and mix thoroughly.
At the next stage, it is advisable to stock up on a special culinary thermometer. Cook the mass should be up to 140 degrees. Do not interfere with the mixture constantly - just do it periodically. Upon reaching 140 degrees, the mass begins to bubble and change its shade to a darker one. At this point, the stewpan must be removed from the stove. Add liquid stevia and vanilla extract to the rest of the products.
Mix all the ingredients well and immediately pour the resulting mixture into prepared tins. If you decide to use wooden sticks, you need to insert them right now. Now wait until the mass has cooled, and send the workpieces to the refrigerator, leaving them there for an hour. During this time, your sugar-free candies will finally harden and can be easily removed from the molds.
Such sweets can be stored for quite some time in a simple food container. And you can simply put the candy in parchment or bag.
Second option
No less tasty and healthy are candies made on the basis of pure fructose. Such sweets are almost identical to products made from sugar. But in their usefulness, they are much superior to their counterparts. Such lollipops can be given even to small children without any fear. Among other things, their preparation will require a minimum number of products, devices and time.
So, prepare in advance:
- 200 g of fructose;
- any molds for sweets.
If you do not have special containers, you can do them yourself. To do this, you need a few candle tablets, bamboo sticks and parchment.
How to make sugar-free baby candy
The first step is to prepare molds for future candies. If you decide to make them out of candles, then the process will take you literally a few minutes. But the result will certainly surprise you.
Remove the candles from the molds, and then make a small hole in each of them on the side. Due to the fact that sugar-free candies turn out to be very sticky, and the containers taken are not food, they should be covered with parchment paper inside. For convenience, it is best to cut small circles with a diameter of 8-9 cm from the material. Put the resulting shapes into shapes, and then insert bamboo sticks into the holes made. This concludes the process.
Now the easiest step is to melt the prepared fructose. By the way, unlike sugar, it can be easily heat treated. So show maximum care, not allowing the burning of goodies. Just a minute after being placed on the stove, fructose will already become liquid. And after a couple, it will boil and turn a little yellow. This change indicates complete preparation. At this stage, remove the stewpan from the stove and immediately pour the melted fructose into the molds made.
After your sugar-free candies have completely cooled, carefully remove them from the containers and treat the household.