№ 550. V for Velvet Pudding

The Little Epicurean

  

The modern-day evolution of ube halaya serves as a reminder of how many occupiers – including Spain, Japan and the United States – have laid claim to the Philippines, and how deeply those eras still impact its food today. The many international influences that have shaped the nation's cultural and culinary identity is perhaps best embodied in a bowl of halo-halo, meaning "mix-mix" in Tagalog....

As ube continues to be incorporated and adapted to international tastes, this time it's Filipinos who are sharing their culinary culture with others. "In the same way our culture took in influences and expressed ourselves with it, I would imagine that other cultures and people from other backgrounds will use our influence and express themselves in their own way," said Villanueva.

Invigorated by the taste of ube in traditional Filipino desserts, I returned home to California and hunted for the tuber in in my hometown. A short drive produced brioche doughnuts filled with ube cream, purple cupcakes topped with ube flan and ube yema cake (a Filipino chiffon cake starring a creamy custard filling). Like the sorbetes that captivated me in Manila, these sweets were stunning to behold. But it's the tuber's subtle vanilla scent, coupled with a nuttiness reminiscent of pistachio, that made those desserts memorable – and makes ube stand out among root vegetables.

And though one might initially judge ube by its purple cover, one bite will surely dismiss any fixation on its hue. It’s the taste that will keep you returning for more.

 

East Meets Kitchen

 

For all its newfound fame, ube — in its raw form — is ugly. It looks like poop at its worst, and resembles a shapeless, hardened piece of rock at its best. Where we get the starchy flesh from is a tuber: technically not a root, but an expanded stem of a plant, where its nutrients are stored. There are many existing types of ube in the Philippines, including three varieties as recommended and approved by the National Seed Industry Council: Basco ubi (whose cortex has a white-purplish tinge), Zambales ubi (purple cortex), Leyte ubi (cream to pink cortex with white flesh), and the original variety called kinampay, known for its sweet aroma and remarkable taste, dubbed as the “queen of Philippine yams.” The kinampay itself includes five further recommended varieties, whose flesh occur in various degrees of red, purple, and white: the original kinampay, kabus-ok, tamisan, binanag, and binato. Others include the varieties of baligonhon (in Bohol), binunas, gimnay, sampero, and iniling. Some local cultivars grown by farmers include binalog, ubsah, appari, negro, alabat, and kameral. In Los Baños, Laguna, where I meet Juanita Calibo, a senior agriculturist in the Bureau of Plant Industry, she says there are even vendors who call the native ubi as hinaligi, because it resembles a post or a wall structure. This is distinct from the ube of Mulanay, Quezon, which I learn is somewhat thin and elongated.