These dead-simple homemade treats are the best pixie sticks you'll ever eat! They're made with real fruit instead of artificial flavors and colors, but still have the exact sweet-tart flavor you love in pixie sticks. And the recipe for homemade pixie sticks couldn't be simpler.
This is a great hands-on activity for kids old enough to operate a funnel, as you'll probably want help filling all those straws. Keep them occupied and entertained making their own portable summer treats!
This is a great hands-on activity for kids old enough to operate a funnel, as you'll probably want help filling all those straws. Keep them occupied and entertained making their own portable summer treats!
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Signing UpStep 1: Tools & Ingredients
Ingredients: (scale as you see fit)
60g dextrose1 (I got mine cheaply from Amazon)
3g citric acid (I got mine at the local yuppie grocery, but it's also cheap and easily available online)
10g freeze-dried fruits of your choice (I picked strawberries & blueberries up at Trader Joe's, and cherries at Whole Foods)
Tools:
scale (especially if you're doing small quantities)
spice grinder (clean coffee grinder or mini food processor)
straws (brightly-colored paper straws look awesome, and hold about 1g powder)
paper funnel & poking stick
1I used dextrose because this is the same sugar used in commercial pixie stix, but you can also substitute table sugar (sucrose). However, since table sugar is generally estimated to be 1.5-2x as sweet as dextrose, you'll have to use 30-40g of table sugar in place of the dextrose in the recipe above, and it may never taste quite "right". I'll run the test myself soon, and update the Instructable with suitable quantities, but in the meantime taste and modify as needed.
60g dextrose1 (I got mine cheaply from Amazon)
3g citric acid (I got mine at the local yuppie grocery, but it's also cheap and easily available online)
10g freeze-dried fruits of your choice (I picked strawberries & blueberries up at Trader Joe's, and cherries at Whole Foods)
Tools:
scale (especially if you're doing small quantities)
spice grinder (clean coffee grinder or mini food processor)
straws (brightly-colored paper straws look awesome, and hold about 1g powder)
paper funnel & poking stick
1I used dextrose because this is the same sugar used in commercial pixie stix, but you can also substitute table sugar (sucrose). However, since table sugar is generally estimated to be 1.5-2x as sweet as dextrose, you'll have to use 30-40g of table sugar in place of the dextrose in the recipe above, and it may never taste quite "right". I'll run the test myself soon, and update the Instructable with suitable quantities, but in the meantime taste and modify as needed.
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Just wanted to say hi after the Maker Faire...I did eventually see Randofo (when he was leaving though!) but thanks for the Sugru!
What do you mean by crimping the end and how do you do it/ what do you do it with?
thank-you once again in advance.Great instructable by the way!
toodle-pip
it looks like you have powdered dextrose and liquid citric acid.
i found that glucose is the same as dextrose and so i have powdered citric acid and glucose syrup/. Will this work?
thank - you in advance!
toodle pip
You're right: I don't think it's logical (?) to encourage a diabetic to pour sugar into her mouth ;-) However, I bet you could do a decent version of this with a combination of the fruit, the tart (citric acid) and a mixture of Splenda (the kind you can measure/pour, in the yellow bag) and Whey Low. Whey Low is a sweetener developed for diabetics by a chemist, and it has 1/4 the glycemic load of regular sugar, and behaves just like sugar. (No, I'm not affiliated with Whey Low!) We've used Whey Low while low-carbing, and it doesn't knock us out of ketosis, and will caramelize on the top of our SF creme brulee! www.wheylow.com if you're curious.
it gives me the runs.
Stevia, though... well, they're getting pretty good with stevia. For years it was soooooo sweet and had that nasty "I just licked an IRS envelope" aftertaste. (Have you ever licked an IRS envelope? Nearly as bad as ear wax, but envelope flavored. Just a bit of extra nastiness to remind one just whom one is dealing with.)
ANYWAY, it's much better now. I think they're even calling it "rebiana" just to trick people from thinking it is the same old yukky stevia. Hm... Just looked that up... Rebiana, which is Coca-Cola/Cargill's trade name for stevia, is the main ingredient in Truvia. Pepsi's competing product is PureVia.
Erythritol-inulin-stevia blends would work as a dessicant, so that would go well with the freeze dried fruit. They're available here and there, even in Walmart.
They totally need to come out with a stevia-xylitol blend... Sucralose/splenda gives me migraines.