you've probably seen food hacks like
these pop up online top tips for tasty
treats but are they too good to be true
videos like these have clocked up
billions of views on YouTube and
Facebook but do all the recipes and tips
feature to actually work or will they
just waste your time and ingredients
here's a milk carton flan from the
lifestyle Channel blossom this videos
had 17 million views you put the
ingredients in the carton microwave it
cool it and out pops a perfect carton
flan
now I followed this video step by step
I've used the exact same quantities but
the eggs and the marshmallows in with
the milk and shook it up to see if I'd
get a flan now the first problem came
when I tried to put this in the
microwave because the milk carton was
too tall it wouldn't fit and that got me
thinking well how did they fit their
milk carton full of ingredients in the
microwave and it looks like they didn't
because if Yuri watch the video you'll
see that they actually just cut the
bottom of the milk carton off not to be
deterred I poured the mixture into a gym
shaker and followed the rest of the
video putting it in the microwave to
boil at 10 minutes and did I get a flan
at the end of it no I did not well just
scrambled eggs really next up gummy bear
hacks easy DIY dessert recipes from so
yummy 3.2 million views in this video
melting gummy bears turns them into
jelly which you can use to create
desserts here's my attempt copying
exactly why I saw in the video turns out
and gummy bears are actually very thick
and gloopy when they are melted not
runny like liquid jelly it was very
difficult to even pour the mixture into
a glass and here is the finished dessert
I didn't put any cream on I hope you can
forgive me but will my spoon go into the
jelly just as effortlessly as in the so
yummy video well no it will not because
as you might expect this gummy mixture
at the bottom of the glass
is rock solid let's have one more this
is from five minute crafts if you've run
out of popcorn why not just shove an ear
of corn in the microwave and it will
turn into popcorn now I'm sure I don't
need to tell you that if you put an ear
of fresh corn into the microwave it
won't come out as popcorn
it will just be hot corn but I was
willing to be proved wrong so I tried it
out in the name of science when it comes
out it is warmer than before
now I'm not the only person that's been
intrigued by this and Reardon is a food
scientist and runs a cookery channel on
YouTube and she's been investigating -
it's the fake news of the baking world
this is faked baking and the reason why
that works is it's more clickable and
clickbait content is what's currently
working on the YouTube algorithm and
apparently also working on Facebook as
well Anne's been trying out a lot of
these recipes on her YouTube channel -
there's one on so yummy where they make
a cake frosting out of strawberry ice
cream and and tried it it didn't work
I've also tried it and it doesn't work
having a fruit science degree I know
what properties different things have
and whether that would actually work or
not it's actually not possible to whip
up ice cream because the fat content
isn't high enough even if you get the
most luxurious ice cream you can get it
will not whip and it will not make
frosting so it's just setting people up
for failure and that's just an example
of the faked ones but there's also some
now that are going into dangerous
territory as well on a five-minute craft
I've got one where they put a strawberry
into bleach to make a white strawberry
if a child was to watch that and try it
and eat it they're going to consume
quite a large amount of bleach which is
obviously not good for them there's also
a so yummy video where they pour molten
caramel over a spinning whisk to get a
sort of bird's nest decoration to go on
top of a dessert and that looks kind of
dangerous so Anne tried it out multiple
caramel is hot like it's hotter than
boiling water so we've made a box and
plastic wrap in front of it there
caramel melted right to it I've
contacted the companies that made the
videos I've featured to get their side
of the story five minute crafts didn't
respond first media which runs so yummy
and blossom invited me to their studio
in LA to prove their recipes work but
they
said I wouldn't be allowed to film it
the company insists it only features
recipes that do work so I can only
assume they don't show all the steps or
use different amounts of ingredients
while we're here
those melted caramel cake decorations I
showed right at the beginning of the
video that's not the best way to make
those either it takes a long time to
melt one sweet and usually they just
burn and stick to the pan the
professional and just as easy way
according to Ann is to put your sweeps
in a blender put a thin layer of that on
grease proof paper and then put it in
the oven for just a few minutes that's a
quick and easy way to make caramel cake
decorations that you can try