The Big Mistake You're Making With Candied Fruit
TikTok can make just about anything trendy, from Dalgona coffee to cloud bread. However the latest food trend is slightly sweeter: candied fruit. Now, this isn't the chewy cubes of brightly-colored preserved fruit that your grandmother put in her "famous" fruitcake. Instead, it's just a way of upgrading everyday fresh fruit to have a crisp candy coating, just for fun (via She Knows). The recipe is only three ingredients: sugar, water, and the fruit of your choice.
To make this "candied fruit," all you have to do is combine a quarter cup of water with a half cup of sugar in a saucepan and bring it to a boil. Once the mixture is boiling and all of the sugar has dissolved, dip each piece of fruit so it's thoroughly coated in the mixture using a toothpick or a fork to ensure you don't burn your fingers. Then, immediately submerge the fruit in a bowl of ice water to crystalize the sugar coating. Just be sure to eat them within one to two hours or you'll be left with a sticky mess. TikToker @samandjessofficial used grapes, strawberries, and pineapple, but you can use any fruit you like. However, the one thing their post didn't show was how to go about cleaning the sticky, sugar-encrusted saucepan afterwards.
The easiest way to clean up after making candied fruit
Once you've candied all your fruit and eaten it, you'll be left with a pan with solidified sugar syrup stuck to the bottom. Luckily, there's a cleaning hack for that. Just fill the pan with very hot water and let it sit for a few hours. Or, for even faster results, place the saucepan back on the stove and bring the water to a boil (via Serious Eats). This should dissolve the remaining sugar, so you can just pour it down the drain and wash the pan as you usually would. In fact, this trick works for just about any candy you might make, including caramels and toffees (via The Kitchn).
If, however, you find there's still some stubborn candy left over that won't dissolve or it's taking more time than you'd like, you still don't need to resort to using elbow grease. Instead, add half a cup of vinegar to the pot and bring the mixture to a boil for about 10 minutes, until all of the stickiness has disappeared (via She Knows).