About this recipe
Chè is not one dessert but a whole category — sweet soups and puddings built on beans, tubers, jellies, fruit or grains, served hot or cold. This recipe teaches chè chuối, a southern version of banana in warm coconut cream with tapioca pearls, chosen because it needs no soaking and no specialist equipment. The chapter notes several other members of the family below.
Recipe facts
- Yield
- 4 servings
- Prep
- 15 minutes
- Cook
- 25 minutes
- Total
- 40 minutes
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Spice
- None
Allergens Contains coconut and peanuts (garnish). Naturally gluten-free and dairy-free. Vegan if the sugar is unrefined-safe.
Development draft. This is an untested development recipe from the cookbook project. It has not been kitchen-tested, and the quantities and timings are the author’s working draft rather than a verified result.
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup (60 g) small tapioca pearls
- 2 cups (475 ml) water
- 1 can (13.5 oz / 400 ml) full-fat coconut milk
- 1/3 cup (65 g) granulated or palm sugar, to taste
- 1/4 tsp (1.5 g) fine sea salt
- 5 ripe but firm bananas, preferably short sweet varieties, cut into 1/2 in (1 cm) diagonal slices
- 1/4 cup (60 ml) coconut cream, to finish
- 2 tbsp (18 g) roasted peanuts, crushed
- 1 tbsp (9 g) toasted white sesame seeds
- 1 pandan leaf, knotted (optional)
Equipment
- Medium saucepan
- Wooden spoon
- Small dry skillet for toasting sesame
Method
- Bring the water to a boil in the saucepan. Add the tapioca pearls, stir once, lower the heat and simmer 8–10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mostly translucent with a small white centre.
- Add the coconut milk, sugar, salt and the knotted pandan leaf if using. Return to a gentle simmer, stirring; do not let it boil hard or the coconut milk may split.
- Simmer 5 minutes, until the pearls are fully translucent and the liquid has thickened slightly.
- Add the banana slices and simmer very gently 5–8 minutes, until they are soft and have taken on the coconut but still hold their shape.
- Taste and adjust the sugar. Remove the pandan leaf.
- Take off the heat and stir in the coconut cream.
- Rest 5 minutes; the chè thickens noticeably as it cools.
- Serve warm or at room temperature in small bowls, topped with crushed peanuts and toasted sesame.
Uses from this chapter
- (No condiment; served as a sweet) (—) — —
The Complete Edition
Chè (Sweet Dessert Soup) sits in the Vietnam chapter
The book carries this recipe in full alongside the rest of the Vietnam chapter, the pastes and dips it is built on, and the twenty-seven pantry studies that open the collection.
In review with Amazon KDP
Both editions have been submitted to Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing and are currently in review. Submitted prices are $9.99 for the kindle edition and $49.99 for the paperback. Neither is on sale yet, and prices are as submitted rather than final.