How to make Osmanthus Sugar | 糖桂花

23/04/2021

Osmanthus Sugar (糖桂花, tang gui hua) is made from fresh osmanthus flowers white sugar. It’s a runny, jelly-like syrup that is sweet and infused with the flavour of the osmanthus flower. Compared to normal syrup, it’s lighter in flavour and has a refreshing flowery aroma.

It’s no chance in heck of having a garden thus we get our dried osmanthus flowers 桂花干 from the dried good store located at Albert Centre around Bugis. There’s a herb and spices lady that sells all kinds of wonderful and mysterious things there.

Benefit of Osmanthus

In the previous post of Osmanthus Longan Tea, we mentioned all the benefit of Osmanthus. During this hot and wet season, it the best natural remedy to keep it at home. It is a well-known herb that can improve skin, detoxify the body, reduce thick saliva in the throat and boost lung health. It is great for all season, Osmanthus tea is often consumed when one suffers from dry skin or hoarseness. Staying indoors with aircon room, we tend to have dry skin and throat and this will be your favourite remedy from now on!

Why make Osmanthus Sugar?

First of all, making sugar out of these flowers will increase the storability of both fresh and dried Osmanthus. Besides this, our favourite way is to make Osmanthus Sugar in advance, store them in a cool dark place.

Make a cup of sweet tea from the sugar by simply dissolving it in water.
(ideally served room temperature or iced)
Make a creative beverage from the sugar by simply dissolving it in soda/coffee.
You can use it to sweeten desserts instead of using normal sugar.
A new replacement of your pure honey, it is like infused honey with make before.

Traditional Method for better flavour.

The common method you see online is to melt the sugar and Osmanthus, making it the Osmanthus syrup before adding it to the honey. This method is simple and fast, however, the fragrance of the osmanthus you will have for the honey is much lighter than using this traditional method that we found.

Starting by ‘Cleaning the Osmanthus’ in the water, pour the Osmanthus, gently rub it a few times, wash off the dirty things like dust. Spread the kitchen paper or toilet paper, dry towel, remove the washed sweet-scented Osmanthus, spread it out, dry it, don’t pile it together, don’t dry it, or else it will oxidise and discolour.

After the Osmanthus is slightly dried, put it in a bowl and add in your sugar. Using your fingertips, rub the sugar and osmanthus, letting it infuse well with the sugar. Then fridge overnight for it to infuse well before steaming it on high for 8 minutes. Cover the bowl with aluminium foil well, as we do not want a water droplet in it. Let the osmanthus sugar mixture cool well before combining it with the honey.

What kind of honey?

During the making of Osmanthus sugar, we tried both dark and light honey. With our experiment of 2 types, we found a distinct flavour for both and it is subjective to individuals. While Angela prefers the light, pure marigold, runny honey, personally I preferred the dark, amber honey, thick-textured honey.

Light – Soft and sweet flavours great for baking and desserts.
Medium – Mild and mellow bite a tasty breakfast choice.
Dark – sharp, bold flavour, warm bite, suited for health remedies. (great making tea and beverage)

Always be creative,never limit yourself with this Osmanthus sugar by just making a cup of sweet tea. Stay tuned, we will be sharing lots of Osmanthus’s recipes with this Osmanthus sugar. Let’s enjoy the season with love and this intense buttery scent.

xoxo, The Sister.