Coconut jelly, sago, and turtle jelly - what are these desserts actually made of?

When summer arrives, desserts and icy treats

start appearing everywhere again

When you drink milk tea or eat sweet soup

there are more and more ingredients you can add

Things like coconut jelly, sago, turtle jelly and so on

So what are these ingredients actually made of?

01

What is the relationship between coconut jelly and coconuts?

Unlike what many people think,coconut jelly is not actually produced directly by coconuts, but is the product of coconut water fermented by bacteria. Coconut water is the part inside a coconut that you can drink directly with a straw. After inoculating it with Gluconacetobacter xylinum, they ferment in the coconut water, using the sugars and other substances in it to produce a polysaccharide - bacterial cellulose. This bacterial cellulose floats on the surface of the coconut water, and as it accumulates it forms a thick white layer. Scoop it out and process it further, and it becomes the coconut jelly sold in dessert shops.

Coconut jelly itself is tasteless, but the main reason it is popular is its smooth, chewy texture. Coconut jelly is also a good diet food. Its main component is cellulose, which cannot be digested or absorbed by the human body, but it can enhance gastrointestinal peristalsis, promote digestion, and increase the feeling of fullness.

02

What kind of rice is sago?

The so-calledsago is actually not rice at all, but is made from starch produced by the sago palm (Metroxylon sagu).The sago palm and the coconut palm both belong to the palm family Arecaceae, and it is native to Southeast Asia. In appearance it looks like both a coconut palm and a palm. The stem of the sago palm stores a lot of starch. People "scrape" the starch out, wash it, let it settle, dry it, and while it is not yet completely dry, shake it round and round like making yuanxiao (glutinous rice balls), and it becomes individual sago pearls. Once cooked, they can be added to desserts. But nowadays, sago is mainly made directly from starch in factories.

03

What are the bouncy pearls made of?

The "pearls" in milk tea, also called fen yuan (tapioca pearls), are made mainly from starch.They are usually made from tapioca starch, though sweet potato starch or potato starch can also be used as the raw material. To achieve a good texture, wheat protein is added, which can bind better with the starch and make the "pearls" more elastic. Early fen yuan were white in color; the more common black version today is generally called pearl fen yuan, made by adding caramel to the fen yuan and thereby increasing the brown sugar sweetness.

04

What is pudding made of?

The definition of pudding is extremely broad; it generally refers to foods made by solidifying ingredients into a solid form. But in the narrow sense, only semi-solid desserts whose main material is custard count as pudding. And thepudding we eat in dessert shops is mostly made from cornstarch, gelatin or seaweed extract, with some food coloring added.

05

Is turtle jelly related to turtles?

Turtle jelly and grass jelly are similar in color and texture, but one bite will tell you that this stuff is unusually bitter, so it is usually served with plenty of sugar and condensed milk and the like.The main ingredients of turtle jelly are "turtle" (the Chinese pond turtle, Chinemys reevesii) and "ling". The turtle part is the turtle's plastron, which is rich in animal collagen - the main factor that allows turtle jelly to set into a jelly. As for ling, it is mainly tu fuling (Smilax glabra), though fu ling (Poria cocos) can also be used.

Tu fuling is a plant called glabrous greenbrier (Smilax glabra). Smilax plants are very common in China's forests and are also very diverse. Most of them are vines and share one common feature: in the leaf axil of every leaf (if you imagine the leaf stalk as an arm and the stem as a body, you know where I mean) grows a pair of tendrils. The underground part of Smilax glabra is "tu fuling".

Fu ling, on the other hand, is a large fungus of the Polyporaceae family, parasitic on the roots of Korean pine. The hyphae of fu ling absorb nutrients from the tree roots and surroundings as they grow, forming a sclerotium. When the sclerotium develops to a certain extent, it emerges above the ground.

06

Whose powder is bingfen made from?

Although bingfen is not found in dessert shops, it is a very common refreshing snack on the streets of Sichuan, Yunnan and other southwestern provinces.What mainly allows bingfen to set into a jelly is pectin(one of the main components of the cell walls of higher plants), and the source of this pectin is the Solanaceae plant Nicandra physalodes(Nicandra physaloides)。

Nicandra physalodes is a very common wild weed. Its most notable features are its light blue bell-shaped flowers with purple spots, and its calyx that swells into a small lantern shape. To make bingfen, the seeds of Nicandra physalodes are soaked in water, the soaking liquid is taken and limewater and the like are added, and after standing for a while it will set. Then brown sugar syrup is added and it is ready to be sold on the street.