Household Ingredients Compared › Gelatin and Agar-Agar (Singapore)

Gelatin and agar-agar: what's actually in it?

Gelatin and agar-agar both set liquids, and they are not the same thing. Gelatin is animal protein (usually bovine — cow — in the Halal products sold in Singapore, sometimes pork, sometimes fish); it melts at body temperature, which is why a gelatin jelly melts in the mouth, and it will not set with fresh pineapple, kiwi, papaya or mango unless the fruit is cooked first. Agar-agar is a seaweed polysaccharide — plant-based, vegetarian, halal by nature — and it sets firmer, sets at room temperature, and holds its set when warm. The two are not interchangeable spoon-for-spoon, and a recipe that calls for one will fail with the other if the dose is not adjusted. This page covers both, kept strictly separate: gelatine (the British spelling used on SG packs) and agar-agar, powder, leaf and premix.

This page does not give a health score or a "best" pick. It shows the ingredient list as printed, with the country of manufacture as printed, and flags where a list could not be verified.

The headline, in 30 seconds

Gelatin is animal; agar-agar is seaweed. Bake King Gelatine Powder is bovine origin; Dr Oetker Gelatine is beef gelatine powder; agar-agar is made from red seaweed. The origin is in the list, not the brand.
Bloom strength is the number that matters for gelatin. RedMan's bovine gelatine powder is 170 Bloom; leaf gelatine comes in Bronze, Silver and Gold grades (stronger leaf, less of it needed). The grade is a product fact, not a quality verdict.
Premix is not pure agar-agar. RedMan's Agar-Agar Premix Powders are coloured and flavoured mixes for making jelly in one step — they are not the same product as plain agar-agar powder, and no verbatim list was retrieved for them, so they are not panelled as plain agar-agar.
This page is thin, honestly. Only three products could be panelled with a verbatim list. Plain agar-agar powder — the Cap Swallow Globe packet in almost every SG supermarket — has no retrieved list and is in seen-but-not-verified.

At a glance

Product	Pack size (as printed)	Type	First ingredient	Country of manufacture (as printed)
Bake King Gelatine Powder	not stated	Gelatine, powder	Gelatine (bovine origin)	Singapore (secondary listing)
Dr Oetker Gelatine Sachets	3 × 12g	Gelatine, powder	Beef gelatine powder	Not stated
RedMan Bovine Gelatine Powder — 170 Bloom	not stated	Gelatine, powder	Beefskin gelatine (100%)	Brazil

Panelled with verbatim lists: 3 products. Seen-but-not-verified: see the list below. No prices are shown: they change weekly and would go stale. This site compares ingredients only.

Bake King Gelatine Powder — brand site, full ingredient wording not retrieved

Pack size: not stated · Made in: Singapore (secondary listing) (as printed)

Ingredients (Bake King official SG site): Gelatine — bovine origin. (Brand site: 'Halal Certified. Bovine origin.')

For jellies, puddings and desserts. Directions: add to hot water/liquid, beat briskly, add to other ingredients, refrigerate until firm; 3 teaspoons set 2 cups (1/2 L) of liquid. Flag: the brand site states bovine origin and Halal certification, but the full text of its Ingredients section was not retrieved in this pass, so this panel records the product as single-ingredient bovine gelatine on the brand's own description — the SG pack still needs a photo to close it. Country of manufacture: Singapore, per a secondary retailer listing (Chaldal) — flagged as secondary, since the brand site does not state it. Halal Bovine

Dr Oetker Gelatine Sachets (3 x 12 g) — UK / Open Food Facts list, SG pack not transcribed

Pack size: 3 × 12g · Made in: not stated (as printed)

Ingredients (Open Food Facts and UK retailer listings, agreeing): Beef Gelatine Powder (contains SULPHITES).

One sachet sets 1 pint of liquid; 1 sachet is roughly equivalent to 4 leaves of gelatine. May contain egg. Flag: UK listing and a Desertcart SG listing; no SG pack transcription was retrieved, so verify on the SG pack. Dr Oetker also sells Vege-gel, a vegetarian alternative — a different product, not panelled here. Country of manufacture: not stated on the retrieved listings. Allergen: sulphites Beef

RedMan Bovine Gelatine Powder — 170 Bloom — pack photo on social media, SG pack not transcribed by this project

Pack size: not stated · Made in: Brazil (as printed)

Ingredients (as shown on the pack in a social-media photo): 100% beefskin gelatin.

RedMan is Phoon Huat's house brand. The pack photographed states 100% beefskin gelatin, origin Brazil, manufactured for Phoon Huat Pte Ltd in Singapore. Flag: the list and origin come from a pack photo posted on social media, not from a retailer ingredient section — the wording is the pack's own, but confirm it against a second pack photo before publish. Country of manufacture: Brazil (as printed on the pack shown). Beefskin 170 Bloom Origin: Brazil

Seen but not verified — do not panel until checked

Cap Swallow Globe Agar-Agar Powder — the yellow packet in almost every SG supermarket, Halal, made/distributed by Jim-Willie Trading Co. Pte Ltd, Singapore. No verbatim ingredient list was retrieved in this pass, so it is not panelled — this is the single biggest gap on this page.
Bake King Agar Agar Jelly Powder — listed at FairPrice and on the Bake King SG site as a plant-based gelatin alternative from red seaweed. No full ingredient wording was retrieved for the SG product. Warning: Desertcart and other marketplaces list a different 'Bake King' agar-agar powder (India, Sweet King India, country of origin India) — that is not the Singapore Bake King and none of its listings was used here.
RedMan Agar-Agar Premix Powder — Red (and other colours) — listed at FairPrice (origin Singapore); the FairPrice key information says it is a plant-based gelatin made from seaweed, sugar-free, with no taste or smell, and that it sets more quickly than gelatin. No verbatim ingredient list was retrieved, and a premix is not plain agar-agar, so it is not panelled as one.
RedMan Gelatine Leaf — Bronze, and RedMan Bovine Gelatine Leaf — Gold (GELITA) — listed at FairPrice and in the Phoon Huat catalogue; no ingredient list retrieved for either grade. Leaf gelatine is the same ingredient as powder gelatine in sheet form; the grade (Bronze / Gold) is the bloom strength, and each grade needs its own row if panelled.
Dr Oetker Vege-gel — the vegetarian alternative to Dr Oetker gelatine; no ingredient list retrieved.
RedMan Gelatine Powder — Fish Skin (100% fish skin gelatin) — listed in Phoon Huat channels; no SG ingredient list retrieved. Fish gelatine is a different product from bovine gelatine (different source, different setting behaviour) and needs its own row.
GELITA Leaf Gelatine — Bronze (Halal) — the leaf behind RedMan's leaf products; no SG list retrieved.
Agar-agar strips / bars and flavoured jelly powders (e.g. Nutri Jell) — sold in SG supermarkets; no SG lists retrieved in this pass.

Nutrition — what the numbers say

All figures in the sortable table are as sold, per 100 g (or per 100 ml for liquids, where the source gives per-100 ml). Click a column header to sort low to high; click again for high to low. Rows marked "not stated" always sort last — a missing figure is not zero. Per-serving-only figures are in a separate table below and are never sorted against per-100 g figures.

Salt and sodium: salt = sodium × 2.5. The table shows sodium as printed (in mg) with the salt equivalent in brackets. Sodium is not presented as salt, and salt is not presented as sodium.

Total vs added sugars: Singapore packs list total sugars, not added sugars. A total-sugars figure is never labelled here as "added sugar". Where a source states an added-sugars figure separately, it is noted. The ingredient list remains the evidence for added sugar versus naturally occurring sugars.

Open Food Facts is a community database and is flagged as secondary where used: the pack and the retailer nutrition section take precedence if they disagree. Figures marked "not stated" were not in the source retrieved; they are not estimated, borrowed from another variant, or copied across flavours. No Nutri-Grade is quoted or assigned on any page in this batch — no official Nutri-Grade was found printed on any of these products, and these are not drinks in the Nutri-Grade sense except where a drink is involved (none here).

No per-100 g nutrition panel was verified for any product on this page in this pass, and no per-serving panel was verified either. That is a gap, not a zero: these products are used in small quantities, but their panels still need retrieving from SG packs or retailer nutrition sections before publish. No per-100 g or per-serving nutrition panel was verified for any product on this page. Gelatine is essentially protein and agar-agar is essentially seaweed fibre/carbohydrate, but no numbers are tabled without a source: a social post for a different brand's beef gelatine gives protein over 85 g per 100 g, and a generic beef-gelatine specification gives over 85% protein, under 15% water and under 2% ash — neither is this page's panelled product's own panel, so neither is tabled. The panels still need retrieving from SG packs before publish.

Seen but not verified (nutrition): no per-100 g nutrition panel was verified in this pass for Bake King Gelatine Powder, Dr Oetker Gelatine Sachets, RedMan Bovine Gelatine Powder — 170 Bloom. Their ingredient panels are unchanged; their nutrition figures are not estimated here.

How to read a gelatin and agar-agar label — the jargon, in plain English

Gelatine / gelatin: The same ingredient, two spellings: 'gelatine' on SG/UK packs, 'gelatin' on US packs. It is protein extracted from animal collagen (skin, bones) — bovine, porcine or fish, depending on the product.
Bloom (strength): The measure of a gelatine's setting strength, in grams. Higher Bloom sets firmer. RedMan's bovine powder is 170 Bloom; leaf grades (Bronze, Silver, Gold) are different Bloom bands, not different ingredients.
Leaf vs powder gelatine: The same ingredient in two forms: sheets (leaves) soaked in cold water, or powder bloomed in water. One 12 g sachet of Dr Oetker powder is roughly 4 leaves. The form changes the method, not the ingredient.
Agar-agar (E406): A gelling agent from red seaweed. Plant-based, sets at room temperature, holds its set when warm, and sets firmer and less 'melty' than gelatine. Also called China glass, Japanese kanten, or vegetable gelatin.
Premix powder: A one-step jelly mix (agar-agar plus sugar, flavour and colour, in proportions the maker chooses). It is not plain agar-agar, and its list will be longer.
Vege-gel: Dr Oetker's vegetarian gelling alternative to gelatine. A different product with a different list — not interchangeable with gelatine without checking the dose.
Why fresh pineapple stops gelatine setting: Fresh pineapple, kiwi, papaya, mango and figs contain enzymes that break down gelatine. Cooked fruit (enzymes destroyed) works fine. Agar-agar is not affected the same way.

What this page is not

Not a health score, and not a "best" pick. The products above are different products, and this page does not rank them.
Not a taste test, and not a price comparison. Prices change weekly; ingredients change less often, but still change.
Not complete. The products in seen-but-not-verified are not yet panelled, for the verification reasons given, not hidden.

Sources and method

Checked 12 November 2026 from: Bake King official SG site (Gelatine Powder 60 g/150 g/350 g/600 g — 'Halal Certified. Bovine origin.', directions, 3 teaspoons set 2 cups; full Ingredients-section wording not retrieved); FairPrice listings (Bake King Gelatine Powder 60 g; RedMan Gelatine Leaf — Bronze; RedMan Bovine Gelatine Leaf — Gold; RedMan Agar-Agar Premix Powder — Red, origin Singapore, key information: plant-based gelatin made from seaweed, sugar-free, sets more quickly than gelatin, also known as China glass / Japanese kanten / vegetable gelatin); Open Food Facts and UK retailer listings for Dr Oetker Gelatine Sachets 3 x 12 g (Beef Gelatine Powder (contains Sulphites), 1 sachet sets 1 pint, equivalent to about 4 leaves; Desertcart SG listing for the same product); social-media pack photo for RedMan Bovine Gelatine Powder 170 Bloom (100% beefskin gelatin, origin Brazil, manufactured for Phoon Huat Pte Ltd, Singapore) and for RedMan Beefskin Gelatine 170 Bloom 30 Mesh 1 kg bags; Phoon Huat catalogue (RedMan Bovine Gelatine Leaf Gold 1 kg / GELITA); Facebook post on Cap Swallow Globe agar-agar (Jim-Willie Trading Co. Pte Ltd, Singapore — no list retrieved). Cold Storage publishes no ingredient list on any product page, so its shelf could not be panelled from its site. Full per-fact source list is in the accompanying research notes. Nutrition: no panel was verified for any product on this page; nothing is estimated. Where a full pack list could not be verified, the product is in seen-but-not-verified instead of being panelled.