August 18, 2022, 11:55 AM
I love food, especially sweets, but I can’t bake or cook.
My kitchen experiences are mostly limited to cutting raw vegetables and steaming tofu for salads. Nothing too complicated.
Do you know what else isn’t supposed to be too complicated? TikTok recipes.
With an average video duration of under one minute, how complex can they get?
Using different types of LIN sugar, we tried three TikTok recipes.
Photo by Karen Lui.
1. Air-fried chocolate chip cookies
This cookie recipe intrigued me as my few experiences with an air-fryer were mostly limited to savoury food.
According to the TikTok video, these air-fried cookies will turn out soft, like a Subway cookie.
We substituted the baking chocolate with a smaller amount of chocolate chips, but feel free to add more chocolate if you’re a major chocoholic.
Ingredients
- ½ cup LIN Natural Brown Sugar
- ¼ cup LIN Caster Sugar
- ½ cup melted butter
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cup of plain flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 cup chocolate chips
- Pinch of salt
Photo by Karen Lui.
Steps
1. We put the caster sugar, brown sugar, and melted butter into a mixing bowl and whisked.
Photo by Karen Lui.
2. We added the egg and vanilla extract in and whisked again.
Photo by Karen Lui.
3. We added the flour, baking soda, and chocolate chips, and whisked again.
Photo by Karen Lui.
4. When the ingredients were well mixed, we left it in the freezer for 30 minutes. In the meantime, we preheated the air-fryer at 170°C.
Photo by Karen Lui.
5. Once the 30 minutes were done, we scooped them out with a spoon into the air-fryer that lined with parchment paper.
Contrary to the video instructions, we recommend smaller and flatter scoops to ensure that the cookies are fully baked.
Use a much smaller scoop than this one. Photo by Karen Lui.
6. We air-fried the cookies for eight minutes at 170°C.
Photo by Karen Lui.
7. We recommend letting the cookies rest for around 30 to 45 minutes if you find the cookies too soft when they’re fresh out of the air-fryer.
Taste test
The cookies looked a little unpolished but most importantly, they looked and tasted like chocolate chip cookies.
Photo by Karen Lui.
Our colleagues who tried the cookies described the taste as “not bad” and “not too sweet”.
2. Brown sugar iced latte
As a fan of brown sugar boba with oat milk, I was pretty excited about this one even though I’m not a coffee drinker.
Unfortunately, this TikTok recipe did not come with any measurements so we came up with our own.
You might have to adjust the recipe according to the size of your glass and taste preferences.
We also substituted the coffee granules for brewed black coffee.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon of LIN Natural Brown Sugar
- 1 teaspoon of LIN Pure Icing Sugar
- 2 tablespoons of hot water
- 3 drops of vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon of cinnamon
- ¾ cup of black coffee
- ¾ cup of oat milk (or other milk alternatives)
- ⅓ cup of heavy cream
Photo by Karen Lui.
Steps
1. We mixed brown sugar into hot water, ¼ cup of coffee, vanilla extract, and cinnamon and set it aside.
Photo by Karen Lui.
2. In another cup, we whisked the heavy cream, icing sugar, and two tablespoons of brewed coffee to create foam.
Photo by Karen Lui.
3. We filled our glass of choice with ice and added the milk, followed by the sugar-coffee mixture.
Photo by Karen Lui.
4. We topped the drink with the foam and dusted some cinnamon powder.
Photo by Karen Lui.
Taste test
The coffee, oat milk, and brown sugar flavour complemented one another very well while the foam added creaminess to each sip.
Non-coffee drinkers can consider swapping out the coffee with tea or just have it as brown sugar milk.
If you don’t have much of a sweet tooth, consider dialing back on the sugar or adding more coffee.
Hardcore coffee drinkers might also prefer to opt for Espresso instead of brewed coffee for a stronger coffee taste.
3. Candied fruits (tanghulu)
I’ve always wanted to try this recipe after seeing Jennie and Jisoo from K-pop girl band BlackPink do it.
It looked simple enough, according to this TikTok recipe.
Ingredients
- 1 cup LIN caster sugar
- ½ cup water
- Strawberries or other fruits of your choice
- Iced water bath (optional)
- Wooden chopsticks or satay sticks
Photo by Karen Lui.
Steps
1. We put the sugar and water in a saucepan on medium to high heat without stirring.
Photo by Karen Lui.
2. As we did not have a cooking thermometer, we eyeballed the bubbling of the sugar to see when it matches that in the video.
Photo by Karen Lui.
3. Once that happened, we took the saucepan off the heat and started dipping our fruits in.
Unlike the person in the video who dipped the strawberries in by holding the leaves, we chose to use wooden chopsticks for safety (and also because we’re scared).
Photo by Karen Lui.
4. After dipping the fruit in, let the excess sugar syrup drip off into the saucepan first before you transfer it to the iced water bath or to your plate.
Photo by Karen Lui.
5. We let the tanghulu rest for a little longer on the plate before eating.
Taste test
Compared to fresh strawberries (yes, I pinched a few earlier), the strawberry tanghulu felt a little juicier.
Besides adding a crunch to the texture, the hardened sugar layer helps cut through the tartness of the strawberries.
Photo by Karen Lui.
While the grape one looked a lot like quintessential tanghulu, the sugar overpowered the taste of grapes.
Which is why fruits with a stronger tart flavour like strawberries, pineapples, oranges, and kiwi, work better with this tanghulu recipe.
To describe it in Jennie’s words, it was “not bad”.
Experimentation with LIN Caramel Granulated Sugar
Out of curiosity, we also tried the tanghulu recipe by substituting LIN Caster Sugar with LIN Caramel Granulated Sugar that is enriched with fructose and boasts a sandy tint.
Tanghulu made with LIN Caster Sugar (top) and LIN Caramel Granulated Sugar (bottom). Photo by Karen Lui.
Everything worked well until we tried to eat them.
Unlike the caster sugar tanghulu that bore the classic hardened sugar layer that melted a little but mostly remained on the fruits’ surface, the one made with caramel granulated sugar didn’t adhere very well to the fruits.
When we tried to lift the tanghulu off the plate, the caramel granulated sugar layer was slowly “peeled” off the fruit.
The texture was also very different — very sticky with a gumminess that reminded me of traditional malt candy that stuck to the insides of my mouth.
In this case, Jisoo’s words, “not bad but not good”, might be more apt here.
According to LIN Sugar, LIN Caramel Granulated Sugar can also be used in coffee or tea, or recipes for churros, caramel pudding, caramel popcorn, etc.
LIN sugar by Maxwill Group
Besides brown sugar, caster sugar, caramel granulated sugar, and icing sugar, LIN offers a wide range of sugar products for your everyday and baking needs.
For example, they have refined sugar in convenient sachets for your daily cuppa.
Photo via Maxwill’s website.
These sugar products can be found at selected outlets of NTUC FairPrice, Sheng Siong, Haomart, and Bake with Yen.
Besides sugar, one of Maxwill's latest products includes zero per cent calorie syrup.
Photo by Karen Lui.
While it's yet to hit our shores yet, Maxwill has plans to bring this in soon so keep your eyes peeled.
Maxwill
Established in 1996, Maxwill is a sugar specialist company and is the sole distributor of LIN Sugar.
Check out the full range of sugar and other products that are offered by Maxwill here.
This sponsored article by Maxwill x LIN sweetened this writer’s boring afternoon.
Top images by Karen Lui.
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