Pickles and Tea Blog

I don’t know why, but snowy days and cold weather tend to bring on a bout of nostalgia.

The temperatures dipped into the teens and about 10 inches of snow fell on Tuesday, unusual for Northern Virginia. As I was curling up on my couch and wishing we had a fireplace, I began to yearn for the warm, comforting mung bean (we called them green beans) porridge my mom used to make on the rainy, tropical days of my childhood.

I rummaged in my pantry, hoping my memory served me right and an unopened bag of mung beans would magically reveal itself.

I whooped with joy when I found it stashed in a back corner!

Relying on taste memory and vague recollections of my mom making the porridge, I poured the mung beans into a pot, added water, and tossed in some ginger slices. About 30 minutes into cooking, I added some palm sugar and tasted it. Hmm, something wasn’t right.

Then it hit me—the sweet, floral aroma of daun pandan, or pandan leaf, was missing.

What luck–I had a stash in the freezer I’d almost forgotten about. After defrosting a couple of blades under hot running water, I knotted them together and threw them into the pot. Perfect!

Thus I was reminded how ubiquitous this leaf is in Southeast Asian cooking.

The pandanus genus comes in many species and sizes—and is used for everything from weaving mats to folk cures and cooking. Its growth is restricted to the tropics and culinary pandan is cultivated widely in Asia. I remember the row of pandan plants hedging my aunt’s garden in Indonesia, both perfuming the air and stocking the kitchen. The erect green plant has fan-shaped sprays of long, lush, bladelike leaves that grow in a spiral around the stem, hence its other name, screw pine.

Often dubbed the Asian equivalent to vanilla, the pandan leaf has a sweet, almost coconut-ty aroma. It is never eaten but its presence imparts a mellow flavor that permeates a dish ever so subtly. This unpretentious leaf is indispensable in many Southeast Asian dishes, and ubiquitous in both sweet and savory preparations.

When I was growing up, Mom threw knotted (for easy removal) strips of pandan leaves into sugar syrup simmering on the stove, adding a dash or two of red food coloring for a hint of blush. Every evening, she would mix one part syrup with four parts water in a glass and serve it to my dad as an “aperitif.”

She also popped pandan leaves into the rice pot to perfume nasi kuning (Indonesian yellow coconut rice). Elsewhere, pandan leaf is used to flavor curries, and it does double duty in pandan-wrapped chicken (a popular dish in Thai restaurants), infusing flavor and keeping the meat moist at the same time.

Mom would pound the leaf in a mortar with a little water, extracting its juice to flavor cakes and desserts. Among them, my favorite: pandan chiffon cake, basically a pandan-flavored sponge. Another extraction method involves simmering chopped leaves in a small amount of water. Once strained, a strong decoction remains.

Pandan extract is also used to flavor and color various nonya kueh, sticky cakes made with coconut milk, tapioca and/or glutinous rice flour that are a Peranakan specialty. Peranakans are the offspring of Chinese men who married Malay women in the Straits Settlements of Malacca, Penang and Singapore. Thais make little baskets out of pandan leaves to house similar dainty delicacies.

Every so often, I forget to remove the green knot hiding in my rice or porridge. But, daun pandan is always there, brightening my favorite dishes, reminding me of home and the comforting embrace of my mother’s cooking.

~~~

Mom’s Sweet Mung Bean Porridge (Bubur Kacang Ijo)

This fragrant porridge makes for a comforting dessert or breakfast on a chilly day. Gula jawa is an Indonesian brown sugar made from coconut palms and is known as gula merah in Singapore and Malaysia. It is sold in a distinctive cylindrical package at Asian markets. If you can’t find it, use dark brown sugar instead.

Time: 1 hour (15 minutes active)
Makes: 4 to 6 servings

1 cup mung beans (about 7 ounces)
4 cups water
4 ounces palm sugar (gula jawa), chopped (about 1/4 cup)
1/4 cup granulated sugar (or to taste)
One 1-inch knob fresh ginger, peeled and cut in half lengthwise
1 pandan leaf, tied into a knot (optional)
1 cup coconut milk, plus extra for serving
Pinch salt
1 tablespoon tapioca or corn starch, mixed with 1/4 cup water to make a slurry (optional)

1. Rinse the beans and pick out any stones and grit. In a medium bowl, soak in enough water to cover by 2 inches for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight. Drain.
2. In a 2-quart saucepan, combine beans and water. Bring to a rolling boil over medium-high heat. Using a large spoon, skim off any scum or foam that rises to the surface.
3. Reduce heat to medium-low and throw in the ginger and pandan leaf. Simmer for another 45 minutes or until beans start to split open, and are soft and tender. Add more water if necessary.
4. Raise heat to medium. Add both sugars and stir constantly until they dissolve completely, about 5 to 6 minutes.
5. Stir in the coconut milk and add a pinch of salt. Cook until heated through, for 2 to 3 minutes. Stir in tapioca slurry and mix until porridge thickens, about 1 to 2 minutes. Turn off heat and discard the ginger and pandan leaf.
6. Spoon into individual bowls and drizzle with coconut milk. Serve warm.