Terrific Taho

Taho or sweet soy bean curd is a sweet Filipino dessert or snack and a usual street food in the morning. The Philippines is said to be the sole country to make this unique delicacy for soy bean curd. There are soy yogurts in the west but this is really similar to yogurt since the taste is similar to yogurt and use soy milk instead of cow’s milk.

The well-loved taho is now part of a business franchise (photo courtesy of watimbox.com)

Meanwhile, taho is comparable to Japanese tofu but softer and breaks easily. This is gelatinous street food and sweetened by sugar syrup or arnibal and sometimes added with vanilla, macapuno and sago.

How to Make Taho

Ingredients:

1 kilo soybeans

7 liters water

4 bars gelatin

500 grams brown sugar

Tools needed:

Blender

Stove

Whisking spoon

Cheesecloth

Kitchen thermometer

Plastic bowl

Sieve

Instructions:

Pick fresh and premium quality soybeans. You can see that the soybeans are fresh if they don’t have spots and free from any stains. Rinse them, and then soak the soybeans overnight. After soaking, rinse the soybeans and clean them thoroughly. You will notice that the soybeans have expanded to at least three times its original size. Drain the beans then remove the hulls.  Blend the beans and make a puree. In the same way, place the puree for the bean curd into a bowl and stir with water gradually, using only a liter of water. With the cheesecloth, sieve the soy puree to get soya milk.

Preparing the gelatin

Put the gelatin bars in a liter of boiling water and simmer for about 10 minutes or until the water reaches 80 degrees Celsius. In this level of temperature, allow the soymilk to simmer for another 7 minutes or until the bean grains disappear.

Put and combine the absorbed gelatin into the simmering soya milk. Discard the foams on top of the milk. Remove from the stove then allow enough time for cool down. With the cheesecloth, sieve the soymilk and eliminate the remains of the gelatin bars. Then pour into a baking pan or a prepared mold.  Reserve this for cool down and let it solidify for about an hour. While waiting, you can prepare the syrup and sago.

To prepare the syrup, heat a liter of water and melt 500 grams of brown sugar. When the soya milk hardens, get several scoops, add sago, pour the syrup then serve while hot.