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Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Thạch Dừa Sương Sa (Coconut Juice Jelly)


Fresh Coconut Juice is my children's favorite drink of all time. I can use it to coax them into doing anything including their Kumon homework or sweep the floor, even if it's only for a moment. Recently I introduced them to this Thạch Dừa Sương Sa  and they've been hooked; they keep asking me to make it for them almost every week. Coconut Juice Jelly contained pure fresh coconut juice, coconut meat and agar-agar which is a vegetarian gelatin substitute produced from a variety of seaweed vegetation. 


I bought the young coconut three times and had only  been lucky once with finding a fresh coconut.  The other times, either the coconut juice was murky or tasted sour or the meat was purple. I had to take the loss and toss them. The difficulty with this is you don't usually know how long they've been sitting out; there's no freshness or sell by date. Learning from this mistake, I've developed a backup plan; I buy a bag of frozen shredded young coconut and a few cans or bags of coconut juice that I know I can rely on just in case the fresh coconuts aren't fresh after all.. 
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RECIPE: Thạch Dừa Sương Sa

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Ingredients


1 bag Agar-Agar - 25 grams or .88 oz
3 Fresh Young Coconut (make 7 cups of coconut juice)
1/2 cup Sugar
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Prepare Young Coconut


Chop the top of the young coconuts. Measure 7 cups of coconut juice.  If there isn't enough of coconut juice, add water to make 7 cups total.  Scrape the coconut meat with a spoon.  Cut in into strips.  Set them aside.  In case your coconut doesn't have enough meat, get a bag of shredded young coconut meat.

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Making Thạch Dừa Sương Sa


In a pot, combine agar-agar, coconut juice and sugar.  Mix well.  Stir it constantly until boil. 
Pour it into a mold.  Let it cool down for a few minutes.  Scatter coconut strips on top of the jelly.  Let it gel in the fridge. 

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Presentation


Cut the jelly into any shape you prefer and then cool down with this as your snack or dessert. It's simply delicious.
Enjoy!

7 comments:

  1. Hi Loan,

    I just wanted to say thank you from the bottom of my heart for this wonderful treasure of a blog! I found it 3 days ago and I'm an addict. I'm a native from San Jose, Ca and was always around Vietnamese so I consider myself Vietnamese. Since I grew up with the Viet culture, though I'm not. I went to the Viet mall in San Jose and bought a coconut with the agar inside. I'm guess this is the same? If it's the same, the process you made this coconut agar is the same has having the agar inside the actual coconut? So could I take your recipe and place the agar inside the coconut?

    Thanks again for having this blog in english with the actual name of the recipe in the beautiful Vietnamese language.

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  2. It's been half of a year and I finally saw your comment :-). So sorry...
    To answer your questions, the coconut with the agar inside is the same as this one. After boiling the agar, pour it inside the actual coconut.
    Thanks for being my blog follower. It means so much to me.

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  3. I Love your Site. I really like your recipes. I live in Sacramento and am Vietnamese. Is there any chance i might be able to get some gai plant from you. My email is dmccathy56@gmail.com. Please let me know and i would be happy to come to your house or meet you somewhere to get the plant.

    jackie mccarthy

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  4. I love your blog, thank you for sharing!!

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  5. I've been following your blog for 2 years now. Been trying almost every recipe u posted. Thanks for the hard work! My bf said my cooking skill has improved. Thanks to you Chi Loan.

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  6. Hi Loan,
    Is this jello recipe of yours come out to be soft or hard texture?

    ReplyDelete