Lots of eyeball eating in Tokyo, eh? Hehe, Happy Halloween! A day late, but I have a good excuse. It turns out that making jelly eyeballs is not as easy as it sounds. It took me FIVE TRIES to get a half-way decent result. I was dead set on making a spooky snack for Halloween, and I meant to get this post up earlier in the week, but these eyeballs were SO HARD to make. The biggest problem I ran into was getting the eyeballs to unmold without totally pulling the eyeball in half, which is what happened for most of my attempts. The key is getting the right gelatin concentration, compressing the mold, and freezing.
If you want to make these, good luck my friend. After the amount of failure I faced, I’m not sure if this is totally worth it. Everyone else online makes it look so easy, but I am unconvinced. However, these eyeballs would be a really cool addition to a cosplay if you wanted to cosplay Uta from Tokyo Ghoul or Syaoran’s clone from Tsubasa: Tokyo Revelations.
The Ingredients
1 tbs of colored Jell-O of choice
3 tbs boiling water per Jell-O color
3/4 cup vanilla yogurt
2 packets Knox Gelatin
Black Gel Writing Icing
You will also need a sphere ice cube tray. Mine had 10 cavities.
Make the Eyeballs!
First, portion out the 1 tbs colored Jell-O into a small bowl, and sprinkle 1/8th tsp. gelatin over the top. Add 3 tbs boiling water, and stir to combine.
Then, SPRAY YOUR ICE CUBE TRAY LIGHTLY WITH COOKING OIL and portion out your colored Jell-O into the cavities of your tray. I used a 1/4th tsp measure to get exact portions in each cavity. Then, pop the tray in the freezer to let the colors set, 10-15 mins. When they’re done, add a black dot in the center of each iris for the pupil, keeping the dot low and relatively thin. Set this back in the freezer and let the gel harden slightly, about 30 mins.
While that sets, add 1.5 packets of gelatin to a bowl, and mix it up with half of the yogurt. Let this sit for 10 minutes to allow the gelatin to bloom and absorb all the water.
Pop the mixture in the microwave and heat in 30 second bursts, stirring between each, until there are no more lumps. Then, add in the rest of the yogurt and stir thoroughly.
Remove the tray from the freezer, and test that the pupils are set. Mostly, you don’t want them to move around once the yogurt mixture gets poured over them, so if you lightly touch the pupil and it moves easily, let it harden some more.
Then, pour over mixture.
Spray the lid with cooking oil, place the lid on top, and press HARD. Seriously, you want to press down hard on the sides, the middle, and all around. The molds will fill up completely and the excess will squeeze out the holes in the top. Don’t try to pour this off, just leave it.
Then, place some plastic over the top, and set some really heavy books on top of the whole thing. Pop it in the freezer and let it freeze overnight. The next day, unmold carefully by sliding a knife between the two halves and wiggling open.
The eyeballs will look weird at first, but as they thaw out you will be able to see the pupil again.
So…these aren’t perfect. As they get softer, the iris can move about if you’re not careful. The black gel tends to streak, which is why I recommend you use less from the start. I think I had too much, and it got goopy. But, they do look pretty cool.
Good luck! Have fun! I hope you can try it out. If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. If you have any suggestions for what I should make next, also feel free to leave that below. 🙂