Gelatin powder to sheet conversion

[Amram]

Dear fellow bakers,

I'm planning on making a strawberry chocolate mousse cake in a couple of days which requires gelatin powder. I usually have on problems getting gelatin powder but have been unable to during these times. I do, however, have gelatin sheets. I've never used these sheets before but the instructions in the packet say that you need 6 sheets to prepare a 0.5 l final product. This recipe I plan to use calls for 5g, 7g and 10g for the different parts of the cake. I'm wondering whether somebody could help me to know how many sheets I should use for each? I would greatly appreciate your help as I'm quite nervous to attempt this birthday cake using a form of gelatin that I've never attempted before.

Thank you so much and happy baking!

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Dear fellow bakers,

I'm planning on making a strawberry chocolate mousse cake in a couple of days which requires gelatin powder. I usually have on problems getting gelatin powder but have been unable to during these times. I do, however, have gelatin sheets. I've never used these sheets before but the instructions in the packet say that you need 6 sheets to prepare a 0.5 l final product. This recipe I plan to use calls for 5g, 7g and 10g for the different parts of the cake. I'm wondering whether somebody could help me to know how many sheets I should use for each? I would greatly appreciate your help as I'm quite nervous to attempt this birthday cake using a form of gelatin that I've never attempted before.

Thank you so much and happy baking!

I do not understand the instructions. Full disclosure, I don’t work with a lot of gelatin and when I do I only use gelatin sheets. I hate powder.



The gelatin sheets we use in the US, which are imported from Europe come in four bloom strengths:

• Platinum 235 - 265 each sheet weighs 1.7g
• Gold 190 - 225 each sheet weighs 2g
• Silver 160 each sheet weighs 2.6g
• Bronze 125 - 155 each sheet weighs 3.3g

If you notice there is a weight next to each sheet. That means no matter what bloom strength you have, it will work in your recipe because its been weighted. So if the recipe calls for 3 sheets of gelatin, 3 sheets of bronze is equal to 3 sheets of gold.


But powdered gelatin has no correlation to sheet gelatin because it’s powder. Some people try to say that Knox gelatin powder (a brand here in the US) has a 225 bloom strength. But based on what? Exactly how many grams? Some say the conversion from sheets to powder can be anywhere from .6% - 1.7%. But again based on what?


Most bakers in the US use the following conversion:

7g gelatin powder = 3 gelatin sheets Full disclosure, I only use gelatin sheets so I cannot vouch for this, but it seems to be a common conversion here. And since the recipe calls for powdered gelatin, my guess is it’s probably an American recipe.


Weigh the 3 sheets of gelatin and note the weight.

5 is about 71% of 7

so maybe use 70% of the amount for the 5g

10g is about 143% of 7, so use 140% of the amount for the 10g


To be honest, I am sure you can find a recipe that uses gelatin sheets. Americans home bakers are the only ones who use that horrible powder gelatin

 

[retired baker]

Dear fellow bakers,

I'm planning on making a strawberry chocolate mousse cake in a couple of days which requires gelatin powder. I usually have on problems getting gelatin powder but have been unable to during these times. I do, however, have gelatin sheets. I've never used these sheets before but the instructions in the packet say that you need 6 sheets to prepare a 0.5 l final product. This recipe I plan to use calls for 5g, 7g and 10g for the different parts of the cake. I'm wondering whether somebody could help me to know how many sheets I should use for each? I would greatly appreciate your help as I'm quite nervous to attempt this birthday cake using a form of gelatin that I've never attempted before.

Thank you so much and happy baking!

1 envelope granulated gelatin = 1 tablespoon powdered gelatin = (0.25 oz.) = 3 sheets leaf gelatin.

5g = .17 oz powder gelatine = 2 sheets
7g = .24 oz powder gelatine = 3 sheets
10g =.35oz powder gelatine = 4 sheets

 

[Norcalbaker59]

1 envelope granulated gelatin = 1 tablespoon powdered gelatin = (0.25 oz.) = 3 sheets leaf gelatin.

5g = .17 oz powder gelatine = 2 sheets
7g = .24 oz powder gelatine = 3 sheets
10g =.35oz powder gelatine = 4 sheets

But the gelatin sheets do not weigh the same. So when working by weight, you cannot say the powder directly correlates to a sheet.

3 sheets of bronze gelatin weighs 9.9g
3 sheets of platinum weighs 5.1g
Powder weighs whatever amount you decide to measure out and put into your recipe

So there is no correlations between powder gelatin and sheet gelatin sheets. Pastry chefs in the US will not try to make any correlations. At best they use a range: .6% - 1.7%.

 

[Cahoot]

I've done a lot of Googling on this topic myself when I was looking for a conversion rate. I figured it shouldn't be that complicated - gelatin powder, being almost invariably Knox brand, all has the same strength, and gelatin sheets are standardized into defined Bloom strengths and weights. So there should be a concrete, mathematical conversion that someone would have figured out by now.

But it turns out that gelatin conversion may be the most controversial topic in the entire baking and pastry world! I've seen pastry chefs, textbooks, cookbooks, and others on the internet give wildly different conversation rates. Bloom strength is defined as "the force in grams required to press a 12.5 mm diameter plunger 4 mm into 112 g of a standard 62/3% w/v gelatin gel at 10°C. Several penetrometer type instruments have been adapted to determine Bloom Strength." So it makes sense that it's a linear relationship, right? In other words, something with 200 Bloom has twice the gelling power of something with 100 Bloom. And also, doubling the weight of a gelatin product should also double its gelling power.

From what I understand, since the sheets decrease in weight as they go up in Bloom strength, they're (allegedly) supposed to be interchangeably, e.g. one sheet silver = one sheet platinum. So that's the reasoning behind why some people give a conversion of X grams powder = one sheet gelatin.

Knowing the Bloom strengths and weights of each type of gelatin sheet, and assuming that Knox gelatin powder has a Bloom strength of 225, then intuitively it makes sense to use the straightforward conversion formula of:

Bloom(A)*Weight(A) = Bloom(B)*Weight(B)

However, there have been countless threads on eGullet that discuss gelatin conversions, and through them I found this article where the author received the following conversion formula directly from a gelatin manufacturer:

Bloom(A)*sqrt(Weight(A)) = Bloom(B)*sqrt(Weight(B))

So accordingly to that formula, it's no longer a linear relationship! Doubling the weight of material A won't double its overall gel strength for the purposes of conversion, but only increase it by a factor of the sqrt(2)=1.41. But why?

Unfortunately I haven't been able to find any more information on the topic, really the only solution is to try a conversion method and see if it works. As long as still get the intended results, does anyone really care? I don't even use gelatin often and haven't actually needed to convert sheet gelatin to powder myself. I just thought it was interesting (and frustrating) that after all these years, there's still no published conversion formula yet.

 

[Norcalbaker59]

The 100 bloom sheet is the same as the 200 bloom sheet because the sheets are weighted. So while a 200 bloom sheet is technically more powerful, it doesn’t provide more geling power. At least in the brand that I use, I can’t speak for the other brands. I thought it was a European brand but it’s an American brand it’s called Champion. I just looked them up to confirm. It states you can use any of their sheets regardless of what the recipe calls for because the sheets are weighted.

“This is because we have already calculated the exact interchangeable ratio of gelatine bloom and quantity of gelatine needed and incorporated it into each type of sheet.”

You’re correct there’s no correlation between powder gelatin and sheet gelatin. To be honest these formulas people use I don’t know where they come up with them. I can’t speak to whether or not they’re accurate. Champion also makes powdered gelatin. On their website they state their powdered gelatin is bloom 225. They state conversion between gelatin powder and gelatin sheets is extremely difficult. they don’t explain how to make the conversion, rather they stayed if assistance is needed to contact them.

I guess there’s no publish conversion because aside from there being no correlation between the two, professional bakers tend to use sheets. I think the problem with conversion arises for the home baker. Or at least in the US gelatin sheets are not readily available.

It’s really unfortunate because I think sheets are superior. I don’t use a lot of gelatin but when I do I only use sheets. I always keep 10 to 20 sheets in the pantry. I hate powdered gelatin. I haven’t use powdered gelatin in about 18 yrs.