Recently I got to attend a Canderel Blogger Cook-off held at Jenny Morris´s CooksPlayGround with a couple of other local foodie bloggers and their partners. Each team was given a station with a gas oven and the necessary ingredients. The purpose of the event was to highlight Canderel´s latest range, Canderel Yellow, which is ideal for baking.
Canderel Yellow contains sucralose which is a low kilojoule sweetener that has a clean, sweet taste with none of the aftertaste associated with some other sweetener ingredients. Good news for health conscious cooks, like myself, is that one of the biggest advantages of sucralose is that it is heat stable, meaning it is ideal for cooking and baking. In fact, Canderel Yellow Granular has been specially formulated for cooking and baking at high temperatures. To replace sugar in recipes with Canderel Yellow, use 10g of Canderel Yellow Granular for every 100g of sugar that the recipe requires. The best part is that it contains only two calories per teaspoon!
On our menu for the evening was a delicious mini tomato tart tartin as the starter and for the mains we seared Sicilian style tuna – delectable! After the stress of the cook-off it was time to chill with a couple of glasses of vino and enjoy the fruits of our labour, with Jenny and the other bloggers.
Note: when baking with Canderel Yellow, it’s important to remember that cooking times may be slightly shorter so look out for visual signs that baked items such as cakes are done. The Canderel website has developed a number of tried and tested recipes containing Canderel Yellow including both sweet and savoury recipes which are well worth considering. Recipes include mouth watering treats such as lemon drizzle cake, chocolate chip biscuits, chocolate brownies, honey and walnut cake and even a luxurious carrot cake. On the savoury front watch out for chicken and mango curry, caramelized red onion, garlic and thyme tartlets and glazed ham.
As sucralose is not recognised as either a sugar or a carbohydrate by the body, it does not raise blood glucose or insulin levels and is therefore ideal for use by diabetics. Sucralose is already being used in a number of foods and beverages including carbonated soft drinks, low calorie fruit drinks and yoghurt.
According to Bruce van Litsenborgh, Commercial Head of Canderel South Africa, part of the Fore Good Group, Canderel is committed to bringing the best choice of low calorie sweetener products to consumers. “Our aim was to expand the Canderel sweetener portfolio with a Sucralose product in a specially formulated blend which maintains sweetness at high temperatures. This means that Canderel Yellow is great for use in a wide variety of baking recipes, including those which require high temperatures.”
So if you have any diabetics in your family or circle of friends now is the time to treat them to that homemade carrot cake! Thanks again to Canderel for organising such a fun event and especially for my new Le Creuset casserole dish, I have been lusting over one of these for months so am thrilled!
