Thought I’d share my brother’s homemade Gu recipe/directions. It tastes pretty good, and saves $ (although takes a little time to make). Check out: http://mountainscribe.blogspot.com/2009/06/homebrew-goo.html
-Ryan
It’s not much like Gu or Hammer etc. as Gu even in the non-Roctane versions put amino acids in aswell as the caffeine. They can be easily added though.
Also, it uses quite a lot of regular sugar, which Gu/Hammer etc. don’t, all using fruit sugars in addition to the maltodextrin (although actually no added fruit sugar beyond the fruit flavour itself in most cases)
You can change the viscosity by ensuring the temperature of the mix is high enough after adding the pectin - as described I doubt it’s going to be over 80C which it probably does to maximise it.
You can also seriously reduce the ingredients to save more money - fruit juice, maltodextrin, pectin is enough, the rest is unnecessary - the citric acid / lemon juice are redundant and only needed if the ph of the solution is not enough for the pectin to work - it probably is.
You don’t even need the fruit juice as a starter, you can also just use water, flavour (the kool aid, or Squash in the UK) which makes it quite a bit quicker to make - Boil water, add maltodextin/flavour to it, add pectin, stir.
I am interested in trying this Agave Syrup though, the only place you can get around me in the UK is the health food store, and it’s more expensive than Hammer Gels by itself.
http://jibbering.com/sports/gels.html has more info on my experiments.
That’s ingenuity. I guess in the same way that a Humvee with tank tracks is ingenuity. At what point is purchasing a food product that has nutritional reliability/consistency and substantially longer shelf life so expensive that one must moonshine their gel? Sorry, it just looks it’s one beaker, a Bunsen burner and a strewn stack of twenties away from a meth lab.
But hey, maybe folks can freebase their gel in T2 and get an added kick.
Sorry… for me, just falls into the category of “because one can do it doesn’t mean it should be done.” And I’m as broke as the next guy.
HOLY FUCK… Oppenheimer made the atomic bomb in fewer steps. Gels usually cost what a buck, I mean are you serious all that when you can just buy it for a dollar??? I have a great recipe for a do it yourself carbon bike anyone interested?
HOLY FUCK… Oppenheimer made the atomic bomb in fewer steps. Gels usually cost what a buck, I mean are you serious all that when you can just buy it for a dollar??? I have a great recipe for a do it yourself carbon bike anyone interested?
geeezz people. Sometimes it’s fun to try things yourself, get a little sense of accomplishment out of this, or just enjoy the experience of trial and error, experimentation, improv, adventure…etc to see what you produce. Maybe you’re not familiar with what I’m talking about? Try it sometimes, it makes life more fun.
Nice! My g/f makes goo for us. Our recipe is a little simpler, malto, some water, alternate nuking and stirring… then add some cheap jelly for flavor. That’s it. No pectin, no apple juice.
I forget the exact proportions, but including nuking, mixing, and cleaning up, it’s less than 10 minutes start to finish. Well worth the money saved.
Plus you can experiment with unusual flavors! This isn’t shelf stable, but we mixed some in-the-can blueberries in once. Ain’t gonna see a name-brand flavor of that any time soon… yummy.
Thanks for posting, that’s a really nice step-by-step guide.
Don’t fight comparative advantage. It’s your friend.
honey is a good, and cheaper, alternative
.
honey is a good, and cheaper, alternative
Honey is more expensive than the gels I make, doesn’t contain caffeine, amino acids (which whilst the science isn’t conclusive on performance enhancement are certainly popular with much anecdotal evidence.) and has large amounts of glucose aswell as fructose with the associated issues.
The cheapest jars of honey I can find in the UK are around 15p / 100 kCals. But given the taste of honey is disgusting (way too sweet!), and the price is more expensive than maltodextrin based gels I’ve not actually tried to buy it in bulk, just from the supermarkets.