Monday, April 21, 2008

Sweet Potato, Coconut Milk & Palm Sugar Muffin (Muffin Kolak Ubi)


Finally! I've baked something out of these adorable little sweet potatoes! I've always been a big fan of sweet potatoes.

However, growing up in Indonesia, my family tried to brainwash me with the phrase "gendheng mangan telo".
Loosely translated or misinterpreted:
- If you're stupid, you'll always eat sweet potato or
- You ARE stupid, therefore you eat sweet potatoes or
- Since you eat sweet potatoes, you must be stupid or

- Eat sweet potatoes, you stupid! or...all of the above
Sometimes, when you want to call someone stupid, you can just say "TELO!" (it's Javanese, pronounced as: tay-law!)

Basically, sweet potatoes are considered the food for the poor, as it was cheap. Little did they know that now there are premium Japanese sweet potatoes sold in luxury supermarkets such as SOGO LOL!

So when I came across this bag of little cutie pies, I just grab 'em. They are HK$10 a bag. I always wanted to bake something, so I turned the classic Indonesian Kolak Ubi/Kolak Telo (Sweet potatoes in Coconut Milk & Palm Sugar) dessert recipe into muffins. Wait a minute. Why is my muffin this shape? Yep! I don't have a cupcake/muffin tray yet (I plan to get one soon) ^_^ hihihi

Fresh from the oven!

See the bits of chewy sweet potatoes all over hehehe

Recipe
- 1 bag of small Japanese sweet potatoes (roughly mashed: yielded about 1.5 cups)
- 3/4 cup coconut milk
- approx 5 tbsp palm sugar (I used 3 pieces of solid palm sugar)
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 3/4 cup melted butter
- 2 cups self raising flour (or 2 cups flour & 2 tsp baking powder)
- 1 egg, beaten
- a couple of pandan leaves (optional)

Peel skin off the sweet potatoes, cut into small pieces, wash until the water runs clear, boil until soft, mash with fork/spoon or throw into food processor, leave some lumps for texture. Preheat oven 175C. Over hot water, heat up coconut milk, mix the palm sugar, and pandan leaves until the palm sugar's dissolved, remove pandan leaves. Mix beaten eggs, melted butter, and coconut milk, mix well. Sift self raising flour, add granulated sugar and salt, mix, create a well in the middle, pour the liquid in, add the mashed sweet potatoes, mix well with a whisk. Butter muffin tray (or I used aluminium cake mold), pour the batter up to 3/4 full, bake for around 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes clean.

Enjoy it with a cup of hot jasmine tea ^_^

17 comments:

  1. oh my. I do think that this will taste fab with a cup of tea.

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  2. this is not a muffin..this is cake!!.. palm sugar sounds so good..imagine drip sommore on the cake..

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  3. Rita, this looks delicious...it would go wonderfully with morning coffee.

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  4. I was thinking...why your muffin is this shape?....then I read the reason :P

    I can eat sweet potato as is steamed...so does that make me more dumb? :P

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  5. I love love love sweet potatoes -- they are so good for you, too. Fortunately they're very easy to come by in this part of New England, and we often substitute for butternut squash (also easy to come by) in baked dishes and stews.

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  6. Rita, this looks delicious...I often cook with sweet potatoes and I could imagine it would be incredible combined with Coconut milk into the muffin cake you made!

    Thanks for visiting my blog - look forward to reading more of your cooking/food adventures....

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  7. Hi Rita! You are always so funny. Thanks for the recipe :)

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  8. Haha I should fly you over a muffin tray!

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  9. This looks great and I do like the combo, as we have a M'sia dessert which made of this combo.

    By the way, you got tagged! :)

    Also, let's exchange link since now we have familiarize ourselves! ;) I already added you! :)

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  10. i love ubi. be it sweet potato or tapioca. i do find sweet potato here to be a bit too soggy when boiled tho. sigh..

    tht muffin/cake ubi of urs wud go well w morning/afternoon coffee. ;)

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  11. I am a huge fan of sweet potatoes and this sounds divine with my coffee.

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  12. hi daph...yeah especially teh tongtji (indonesian brand of jasmine tea) hehe

    yo joe...hehehe yeah it is borderline cake i guess (i looked up the diff between muffin and cake finally)...now...lemme drip liquid palm sugar all over u...(then drop u off an ants nest hohoho-how meannnnn of me)

    hi peter and noble pig...u guys are right! this would be perfect with my morning coffee! how cud i forget my caffein lifeline support lol

    hi tigerfish..i guess tat'd make both of us....SUPER SMART wahahaha

    hi lydia...i love butternut squash too! so rich and creamy...especially roasted...aren't we lucky the food we like is good for us? hehe

    hi taste memory, i think sweet potatoes are so underutilised in hong kong...lemme try to do more things with em

    hi maryann, hehehe thanks!

    hi cindy...hihihi i am contemplating a tray of 6 or a tray of 12...i think my oven cant fit 12 hehe

    hi, ching! i think i've already added u but lemme double chk hehehe yeah...we've been commenting on each other's blog for a while eh hohoho

    salt & turmeric, i sooo love cassava...where can i find it in hong kong? T_T sob sob sob let me try to find some this weekend

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  13. Sweet potatoes, coconut milk and palm sugar sounds like they would make really good muffins.

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  14. sweet potato ama coconut milk dua2 nya gw suka. minta boleh?? hehhee

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  15. kayaknya enak banget n ih Rit...:D, buat minum teh apalagi..bisa ga berenti makan...qiqiqiiq

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  16. Ooo yum. I've never seen sweet potato muffins before.

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  17. hahahaha.....telo, ... jadi klo di daerah kamu telo = geblek toh.... Aku baru tau pas tinggal di au klo makan krupuk = kere. wakakak....
    padahal telo termasuk healthiest vegetable, dan krupuk jg gak murah-murah amat, dr yg kere dan kokay makan ini jg.

    You're good at kitchen rit, good idea to mash telo to muffin.

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