Lego brick shaped gummy candies

Step 3: Add some pucker power - Sour Gummies

Sour Gummies

I really like sour flavors in gummy candies.

The official way to make sour gummies is to add Ascorbic Acid Powder. Other powders that will add sour are called Citric Acid or Vitamin C powder. You can buy it in a cooking store, a health food store that sells supplements, probably some pharmacies and I think it's even available at some bulk food stores.

Sometimes it is incredibly expensive, especially if it is from some "Life Extension" or "Body Cleansing" type of vitamin company.

I've never bothered with buying the powder. Ascorbic acid is Vitamin C. I just grind up a Vitamin C tablet with my mortar and pestle. The cheaper the vitamin C the better the flavor I think. Rose hips Vitamin C is not as sour, and has some kind of non sour flavor. I'm not really sure how to describe it.

I'm not sure what the chewables, or timed released Vitamin C's would do, or how they would taste. The added ingredients in those vitamins might not like being heated, and they might cloud up your candies. Just stick to plain cheap generic Vitamin C if you are going to grind your own. For pure sour pucker power, the cheaper the better.

I add the powder of one 500mg Vitamin C to a batch of gummies. That will change the flavor so it doesn't taste so much like a Jello Flavor. I LOVE 3 Vitamin C's - that's a great candy flavor to me. It's one of those things you just have to do by taste. You might like more, or less, than I do.

The easiest way to sour up gummies, and to also give them more concentrated flavor is to add unsweetened Kool-Aid powder! There are a lot of flavor experiments you can try by mixing different flavored gelatin with different flavors of Kool-Aid. They don't come out very clear though.

There are all the other kind of powdered drink mixes. I don't know how they would react if you stirred them into the hot gummy syrup, but I'm sure they would be fine if you rolled the candies in them when you were finished. A good lemonade powder mix would probably taste pretty good.

After it is melted and almost ready to go into the mold, stir in the Vitamin C, then let the syrup sit in the bath for a couple of minutes.

This info applies to candy making in general: When making candy, you will almost always add the flavorings right at the end. The reason is, sometimes flavorings can change flavor or breakdown completely when they are heated. When you are making candy, you will usually cook your candy first, then stir in flavorings right after you take it off the stove.

Have fun and experiment.

Comments

[Xandergust]

I am really excited to try this! Thanks for the post! How long do these stay "fresh"? I want to make these for a party and would love to do this ahead of time, but there's nothing worse than a stale gummy.

[illicium]

Note: Citric acid and ascorbic acid are two different things -- the former is what gives lemons (and other citrus fruits, hence the name) their sour taste and is most commonly used in sour candy.

[mkambas]

yep. ascorbic acid is used as a color keeper/anti-browning agent in jam making.

[SFHandyman]

You are correct. They are different chemicals. What I meant was if your recipe is calling for a souring agent, any of these would work.

[ronmaggi]

Trader Joe's has vitamin C powder that is cheaper than pills. The pills tend to have binders and fillers. Also the tablet making process is energy intensive, and damaging to the vitamin C.

[SFHandyman]

That's great. Thanks for the info.

[Cereleste]

This sounds delicious, but isn't it simpler to just pour the gelatin mixure onto a a "pile" of legos that has the same shape as the silicone? This would be simpler and cheaper, but perhaps the legos have traces of lead in them.

[SFHandyman]

The candies would be inside out with the knobs going in instead of sticking up. If you look at the bottom of the brick, you can see that it wouldn't make either a knob or a hole.

[minkette]

I heard that Jelly babies are made by impressing a jelly baby shaped form into packed bed of corn flower. The jelly is then poured into the hollowed out form to make the Jelly baby. This is why Jelly babies always have corn flower on them. It's all done on a conveyor belt, so that the corn flower form just falls away from Jelly baby and gets re-used. You could try impressing lego blocks into corn flower as a cheap alternative to a real mould - though you'd lose the colour and wouldn't be able to put connecting holes in the bottom.

[SFHandyman]

It's Corn Starch, not Corn Flour. That is correct. I haven't tried it. I'm not sure how easy it would be at home. I'm sure you wouldn't be able to get the sharp corners that you get from silicone.

[szasama]

I've just found out (the hard way) the CORN STARCH is actually called CORN FLOUR in the UK. I asked for it in a store and they had no idea what I was talking about. When I described what I'd be using it for, they said it was right there, and they pointed at corn flour. Very strange....

[SFHandyman]

Wow, now that's really confusing. We have another kind of corn flour here called Masa Harina. It's used to prepare many Mexican dishes. Then we have corn flour that is used for corn bread and to sprinkle under loaves of bread and pizza. Corn starch is used mainly as a thickener for liquids like gravy.

[minkette]

sorry, clarity not colour.

[bronwync]

Fruit juices for flavouring may not work - many fruits contain a protease that will degrade the gelatin. I have a suspicion that lemon juice in jelly stops it from setting, and I know that pineapple, papaya & kiwifruit each have a lot of protease in them.

[SFHandyman]

You could probably use extracts or oils. Extracts are oils thinned down with alcohol. They come from the rind, not the juice, so they don't have any acid or sugar problems. Oils are extremely concentrated flavor. It would probably only take 4 or 5 drops to flavor a batch of candy. That is why they make them into extracts. It's very hard to measure very tiny amounts.

[SFHandyman]

I think it says no Pineapple on the Jello Box. I didn't know about papaya or kiwi. I think lemon would be fine. If it wasn't, it seems like the acid I add from the vitamin C would be a problem. It doesn't do anything except add deliciousness. Needs to be tested though. You can jell many things with gelatin. People jell tomato soup with it. Maybe the fruit problem is why Pectin is used for jams and jelly.

[eurasianbro]

Hm... wouldn't it be a little cheaper or easier to simply melt down a bag of gummy worms in the microwave instead of making them from scratch?

[SFHandyman]

I really doubt it would be cheaper but it would probably be easier. I like to make stuff though. I don't recommend using the microwave in candy making. It heats unevenly and if you aren't careful it can cause the sugar to start burning. Melt them in boiling water if you want to try this.

[bronwync]

It's not the acid that does it, it's the protease. Gelatin is a protein, and proteases break down protein. Pectin is not a protein, and reacts WITH acid to form a different sort of gel. I'm not positive that lemon won't gel, but I seem to remember trying to make a jelly with lemon juice some years ago and it didn't set. Just don't be surprised if fruit added to gelatin stops it from setting. It's actually an interesting experiment to show kids - set a bowl of jelly (jello for Americans) and put some slices of different sorts of fruit, including pineapple and kiwifruit, on top and leave it for a few hours. You can see which fruits break down the gelatin because they sink. The protease extracted from papaya is generally what is used in the meat tenderiser you can buy in the supermarket.

[vangelion]

All true. But enzymes denature (become ineffective) at relatively low temperatures. Pasteurization used in canning generally does the trick, so canned tropical fruits and juices are okay for gelatin setting.

[SFHandyman]

Thank you for the Information. I love learning new things.

[bronwync]

Thank YOU for the instructable, I love gummi sweets. I intend to make these a) for my office lolly-jar, b) for my grandkids.

[Vort]

Great instructable, thanks mate, can't wait to make some. :D

[Eli the Bearded]

For strong sour, I use "sour salt", which is pure citric acid. Look for it with the Jewish food in supermarkets. I use it sometimes to make stronger lemonade, and sometimes in some water in place of lemon juice in recipes.

[SFHandyman]

Oh very very cool. Thanks for the tip. I'd never heard of this.