This dish was inspired by a traditional Filipino dessert called “ginataan”, one of my dad’s specialties.  It is a delicious dessert soup served warm and it is made of coconut milk, rice balls, plantains, jack fruit, and casava.  It seemed like it took my dad hours to make this dish from start to finish, so I wanted to create something similar to it, but a lot quicker.  I wanted to incorporate taro roots in this dish because I didn’t have casava.  Taro roots are a good source of potassium and it also contains some Vitamin C, Vitamin E, Vitamin B6, magnesium, manganese and copper.

This dessert soup is warm and sweet.  It also reminds me of a the tropical islands where I came from, the Philippines.

Palawan, Philippines

Ingredients:

• 4 small taro roots
• 2 cups of water
• 6 tablespoons of small tapioca balls
• 1 can of coconut milk (13.5 oz.)
• 2 yellow plantains
• 6 tablespoons of muscovado (unrefined/unprocessed sugar)
• 1/4 teaspoon of sea salt
• sliced pineapples for topping (optional)

Note: if you can’t find muscovado, use sucanat sugar.

Directions:

1. Boil taro and plantains for 20 minutes in two separate pots (with skin).
2. In another pot, boil 2 cups of water, add tapioca balls, and reduce heat to low-medium.  Stir this frequently with a fork so it separates and doesn’t stick to the pan.  Note: read directions on tapioca ball package.  I let these simmer for about 7 minutes.  Then, I turned off the heat and let sit for another 10 minutes.
3. When the taro is finished cooking, peel off the skin, place them in your blender, and then add coconut milk.
4. Blend them together for a minute then pour the mixture into another pot.
5. Add muscovado sugar into your coconut/taro mixture and simmer for 5 minutes.  Note: stir, stir, stir!
6. Peel off the skins of the plantains then slice them into bite-sized pieces.
7. Add the sliced plantains and tapioca balls (with liquid)  into your coconutty taro soup, then simmer for another 5 minutes.  Don’t forget to stir.
8. Scoop them into a bowl, martini glass, etc. then top it off with sliced pineapples (optional).