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Home / In The Kitchen

What Is Tapioca Syrup? Uses and Benefits

Last Updated: Jan 29, 2023 · Author: Honest Food Talks ·

Tapioca syrup is made from cassava root and is gaining popularity fast as a healthy alternative to high-fructose corn syrup. This vegan sweetener contains fewer carbs and calories than most sweet liquids. Therefore, tapioca syrup is a healthier substitute for sugar, corn syrup, and other sweetener products.

A tapioca syrup in a small white bowl with a syrup dipper
Try tapioca syrup if you're seeking a vegan and diabetic-friendly sweetener. | Image from Antoni Shkraba

Most of us have eaten tapioca at least once. For example, tapioca pearls in bubble tea or tapioca pudding. However, tapioca syrup uses extends beyond adding a sweet taste to a dessert or beverage. This vegan sweetener is a more organic, less-processed choice for your cooking and baking needs.

This sweet liquid is not suitable for a paleo diet as it is refined. However, other diets welcome it as an alternative to corn syrup and sugar. It is an excellent choice for any diabetic-friendly diet and works with the Golo diet.

Jump to:
  • How is tapioca syrup made?
  • Is tapioca syrup unhealthy?
  • Tapioca syrup benefits
  • Tapioca syrup uses

How is tapioca syrup made?

Manufacturers take cassava root and grind it into a powder in the first step of making tapioca syrup. 

Brown tray filled with whole and cut in half cassava roots
Tapioca syrup is made of cassava root with a relatively lower sugar content. | Image from Loren Biser

Once manufacturers have a powder, they apply water to it in hydrolysis. This step breaks down the starch bonds, allowing for the engagement of enzymes in the cassava powder, and produces a sweet sauce.

The longer the hydrolysing process goes on, the sweeter the resulting liquid will become. As a result, you can get very sugary cassava sauces.

Is tapioca syrup unhealthy?

Depending on your current sweetener and diet, this sweetener can be healthier. However, it still contains natural sugar. No diet should contain too much sugar, and you should consume it in moderation.

The cassava root grows in Africa, Asia, and South America, offering a fibre-rich alternative to wheat-based foods. It’s a starch-heavy, drought-tolerant root vegetable with nutty flavours without any nuts, so it’s suitable for people with nut allergies.

Is tapioca syrup better than sugar?

Tapioca syrup is a healthier alternative to sugar. It contains about 15 percent fewer calories than white sugar and has a lower level of carbohydrates.

It also contains lower glucose levels, so tapioca syrup is better than sugar in terms of blood-sugar management.

Tapioca syrup benefits

The main drawback of sugar and corn syrup is that both have high sugar and carb counts. On the other hand, tapioca syrup benefits consumers with lower quantities of both sugar and carbs. 

A lady pouring a tapioca syrup to her brownish coffee latte
Sweeten your hot coffee latte drink with tapioca syrup. | Image from Taha Samet Arslan

Fewer calories

A quarter-cup of cassava sweetener contains about 160 calories. By contrast, A quarter-cup of sugar contains roughly 190 calories. To no one’s surprise, those calories come from sugar, one of the least healthy ways to get the calories your body needs. 

While that’s not a huge reduction, it is a reduction. Cutting small amounts of calories here and there can contribute to weight loss or maintenance as opposed to weight gain. 

Lower carbohydrate count

That same quarter-cup of sugar holds about 50 grams of carbs, while the vegan cassava sweetener contains just over 40 grams.

Managing carbs in your diet can help maintain blood sugar levels. In addition, diabetic patients can benefit from a lower carb intake. Many weight-loss plans include carb reduction as part of their regimens.

Vegan

The sugary liquid comes from the cassava root, which makes tapioca syrup vegan. So, if you follow a plant-based diet, this sweetener can help to replace some key ingredients in baking and cooking.

Tapioca syrup in a transparent glass with a teaspoon above it
In addition to its health benefits, Vegans can safely consume this syrup too! | Image from javier kober

No artificial ingredients

There are no chemical preservatives in organic tapioca syrup. Therefore, it is a healthy alternative sweetening agent with no artificial flavours, colouring agents, or artificial dyes.

Many artificial sweetening agents have demonstrable adverse health effects when consumed in large amounts.

Tapioca syrup uses

Tapioca syrup can perform that job well if you’re looking for a sweetener. But if all you want is something to pour over a desert, you can make your brown sugar syrup. However, for other uses, brown sugar syrup won’t work as well.

When you use it in baking and cooking, cassava sweetener can do more than just add sweetness. You can use tapioca syrup in baking, cooking, or flavouring drinks like coffee or fruit smoothies. As a bonus, there’s no granular sugar in your drink.

Consider also the lower levels of carbohydrates and calories. All this combines to make this sweetener a better health choice for many people.

Binding agent 

We can use tapioca syrup to replace cornstarch’s function to thicken sauces or baked goods. Because of this thickening quality, this cassava sweetener can also get used as a binding agent. 

A delicious bowl of granola with berries on top
Use tapioca syrup to enjoy your bowl of granola for breakfast. | Image from CameronAustin84

It works well to make granola bars too. It will provide the binding necessary to hold the mixture together in a bar form. 

You can also use it for preparing meat that dries out easily. Cassava’s binding properties help the processed meat solids retain moisture. Unless you’re going for beef jerky, avoiding the drying out of the meat is paramount.

Sweetness

Adding this sugary sauce to baking recipes or your tea will help you satisfy that sweet tooth more healthily. As we’ve mentioned before, corn syrup contains high glucose levels. The vegan cassava sweetener contains fewer calories and is a source of lower-glucose sugars.

For example, a bread recipe that requires sugar or honey can use this vegan alternative instead. You can also sweeten drinks like coffee and tea with them.

Texture

Using tapioca syrup in baking provides more than just sweeter. While corn syrup does one thing and one thing only, and that is sweetening food. Meanwhile, this vegan cassava liquid brings other qualities.

The binding ability extends its ability to provide additional texture to foods. 

A pile of pancakes with berries in a wood plate drizzled with a tapioca syrup
Kids will absolutely love their pancakes when drizzled with tapioca syrup. | Image from Nicola Barts

Mixing this vegan sweetener into an acai berry smoothie will add thickness that sugar or honey doesn’t. In baked goods, its starchiness adds some stickiness to the final product.

Think along the lines of the tapioca pearls used in bubble tea. They add texture to the beverage. Add sweet cassava liquid to your baking, which can perform a similar service.

Follow Honest Food Talks on Instagram @honestfoodtalks, a place for foodies like you. Next up, check out some healthy alternatives to ramen noodles.

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