thick water

many ways to consume gelatine

my husband has been battling a tendon injury for a few years now - nursing it, doing all the right things, and gently rehabbing it and building the strength back up

it’s also involved a lot of research and time on pubmed looking into anything that could possibly help give that 0.1% improvement

the study

we came across this study by Shaw et al. which, in short, gave 27 young men a drink containing 15g of gelatine + vitamin c 1 hour prior to a short bout of exercise (i.e. 6 minutes of skipping rope). they saw an improvement in collagen synthesis after ingesting the drink, suggesting consuming this amount of gelatine 1 hour prior to short intensive exercise may be beneficial for tissue repair

we thought hey, why not try it before his rehab calf raise exercises? it can’t hurt!

putting it into practice

now 15g is a phenomenal amount of gelatine to consume in one sitting

for reference, my previous panna cotta recipes have used 1-1.5 tsp (that’s 3.5-5g) across 3-4 servings

it’s also equivalent to 3/4 of an entire packet of aeroplane jelly (~560mL of jelly when prepared)

shaw doesn’t say how much liquid they used to dissolve the jelly, but i can only imagine it was upwards of 600mL. props to the study participants for skipping rope for 6 minutes after drinking that!

i took it upon myself to find slightly more palatable ways of getting this amount of gelatine down

the first attempt - thick water

15g gelatine

500mL water

in a small saucepan, sprinkle the gelatine powder over the water and leave to bloom for 5 minutes

heat gently over low heat until the gelatine powder has dissolved

results

this was disgusting

thick, slightly beefy water from all the gelatine. it tasted like hooves

the second attempt - sweet tea

1 peppermint teabag

500mL water

15g gelatine

15g sugar

add the water and teabag to a small saucepan

sprinkle the gelatine powder over the water and leave to bloom for 5 minutes

heat gently over low heat until the gelatine powder has dissolved

add the sugar and stir to dissolve

results

this was ok! the peppermint slightly masked the beefy flavour

it had to be drunk quickly, as it threatened constantly to set into a peppermint brick in the cup

when made with chamomile tea and left to set it resembled ballistics jelly (remember mythbusters?)

attempts three and four - maybe milk will fix it?

inspired by the extra, extra thick french hot chocolate, i ‘covertly’ added the

gelatine to my go-to hot chocolate ratio and made beefy chocolate soup - not a house favourite

i also tried making a panna cotta, which can only be described by the picture below

it was like chewing on polly pocket clothes

attempt five

my husband was losing steam after weeks of valiently chewing on suspiciously beefy-flavoured non-newtonian fluids

i’d tried dilute liquids, drowing it in sugar, hiding it in chocolate, setting it into solids and was running out of hope when it came to me

hide it in passionfruit jelly

the fruity acidity should cover the hoof-forward notes, and it just felt right for a fruity jelly to be slightly too chewy - reminiscent of terrible jello shots at university

they are…. edible!! and i do think that’s as close as we are going to get

concluding notes

following consistent application of gelatine and vit c prior to rehab exercises, my husband has been able to return to sport with minimal pain

there is no way to hide 15g of gelatine in any normal food

none of this constitutes medical advice