Ginataang Halo-Halo

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend doing something you love! My family and I had a great one! The weather was perfect and we had an awesome camping trip with our friends at Cedar Hill State Park which is about 50 miles away from our place. This was where we had our first camping with our DFW circle of friends, and we thought of going back just so we could explore the place, which we failed to do the last time since it was only an overnight camping. 

I could say we all had a blast! We had our friend's 25th birthday celebration...the boys went fishing...the girls help the kids do some crafts(bracelet and kite making)...and the kids got to watch a reptile show. Though Ryan, Clarise & I suffered much from sneezing, runny nose and itchy eyes because of allergies, the fun, the great food, and camaraderie with good friends made it all worthwhile.  

We've been doing spring and fall camping since 2009, and we're really enjoying it. I guess much more than the thrill of being able to experience nature and sleeping in a tent away from the comforts of our own home, it's being able to spend some quality, distraction-free, time together as a family and having the chance to bond with those closest to us that make us love camping! We truly find camping to be a great way to enjoy the outdoors while building good relationships...and we're definitely doing it again! :)

This dessert that I'm sharing with you today is one of the stars last Friday night. We had chocolate and peanut butter cake, cupcakes and cake pops as well as apple and cherry cup pies, but this Filipino favorite was a hit!

This is called Ginataang Halo-Halo which simply means Mixed Ingredients in Coconut Milk. It is basically a mixture of different tubers like sweet potato, purple yam, and taro root as well as other ingredients like Saba bananas, jackfruit, tapioca pearls, and glutinous rice balls. All I could find was yellow sweet potato so my ginataang halo-halo wasn't colorful as it should be...but it was tasty of course!

In the Philippines, Ginataang Halo-Halo is served not only as dessert but also as meryenda (mid-afternoon snack). As dessert, it is served cold, and as snack, it is usually served warm. This has been my favorite since childhood, and I love it with lots of glutinous rice balls and tapioca pearls! 

For those who love coconut milk, this is definitely for you...

Ingredients:
*Serves 20 

• 3 *19oz. cans coconut cream
• 4 cups water
• 3 cups sugar
• 1 cup small tapioca pearls (I prefer small tapioca pearls because they cook a lot faster)
• 1 cup jackfruit, cut into strips (I used canned)
• 3 pcs. Saba bananas, peeled, cut lengthwise then sliced
• 3 cups kamote (sweet potatoes), peeled and cubed
• 2 cups glutinous rice flour mixed with 1 cup water to form a dough

Procedure:

1. Scoop about ½ Tbsp of dough then mold into a small ball. Place on a slightly greased plate. Repeat until there's no more dough. Set aside. 

2. In a big pot, pour in coconut cream, water and sugar. Cook while stirring until sugar is dissolved.

3. Add tapioca pearls. Simmer with frequent stirring for 20 minutes or until tapioca pearls are almost tender and transparent.

4. Add kamote and simmer for 10 minutes or until cooked.

5. Add dough balls, banana and jackfruit. Keep cooking until dough balls are all floating.

6. Remove from heat. Allow to cool down. Serve as dessert.

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