How to Prepare Coconut Cream and Coconut Milk



How to Prepare Coconut Cream and Coconut Milk

Cracking a coconut demands technique and practice. First, select a mature coconut with a brown husk. Shake it: you should hear juice sloshing inside. Soak the coconut in water for a minute, to tame the brown fibers, then locate the "three-dot-face" on one end of the nut. Using an ice pick or a slim screwdriver, perforate one or two of the dots and pour the juice trapped inside into a bowl. You can drink the juice or, like the Vietnamese and Indonesian, use it in cooking.

Spread newspapers on a solid surface, such as a kitchen floor or sidewalk, and place the coconut on them. Using the dull edge of a cleaver or a hammer, make several quick, determined whacks across the equator of the nut until it cracks. Continue to strike with the hammer, breaking it into smaller pieces. Then with a small knife, pry the meat from the shell and peel off the thin brown skin. Cut the meat into 1-inch (2.5cm) pieces and pulverize it, a few pieces at a time, in a food processor. One coconut will yield about 3.5 cups (1 lb/500g) pulverized coconut.

To make coconut cream, put the pulverized coconut into a bowl and add 1.5 cups (12 fl oz / 375ml) hot water. Let steep for 10 minutes, then pour through a fine-mesh sieve or piece of cheesecloth (muslin) over a bowl and press or squeeze the coconut to expel as much liquid as possible. Place the squeezed coconut in another bowl. This first pressing, about 1 cup (8 fl oz/250ml), is coconut cream and is primarily used as oil for frying spices pastes. For coconut milk, the liquid used in curries and soups, add 3 cups (24 fl oz / 750ml) hot water to the same coconut, let steep for 15 minutes, and repeat the straining and squeezing. This step yields about 2.5 cups (20 fl oz / 625ml) coconut milk. Repeat this step for thin coconut milk. Refrigerate the milk and cream and use within 3 days.

Many Southeast Asians are able to avoid the messiest part of this task by buying already grated meat from market vendors, who prepare it on the spot with a machine. Once home, cooks have only to steep the coconut to make the various grades of milk and cream.


#Ads - Get the above cooking ingredients here at discounted price

More Thai Food Recipes

Copyright 101 Cooking Recipes | All rights Reserved. Sitemap

Contact Us | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy