Comfort Cooking

Covid-19 stay-home recipe: Homemade soya milk

At a loss as to what to cook today? Fret not. In this daily series, STFood Online Editor Hedy Khoo features nourishing recipes you can whip up during the circuit breaker period

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Once you taste how good homemade soya milk is, you may never go back to store-bought ones.

If you use a soya bean-to-water ratio of 1:10, you should be able to get soya milk that is thicker than what most shops sell. Add pandan leaves during the boiling process and the beverage will smell heavenly.

I start by weighing out 210g of soya beans, to allow for up to 10g of wastage from picking out the discoloured ones.

I choose to filter the soya bean mixture after the boiling process to retain the maximum amount of nutrients in the final product. But this means more effort is required to stir the mixture during boiling - to prevent the soya pulp bits from sinking to the bottom of the pot and burning. Using a non-stick pot certainly helps.

Also, skim off the foam at the top to prevent the mixture from boiling over.

Instead of adding sugar directly to the pot of soya milk, make a sugar syrup to add to individual servings. This way, your family members can choose their own sugar level or enjoy the drink sugar-free.

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HOMEMADE SOYA MILK

INGREDIENTS

210g soya beans

2.375 litres of water (375ml water for soaking)

6 pandan leaves (22g), knotted

1/8 tsp salt

SUGAR SYRUP

INGREDIENTS

50g sugar

50ml water

EQUIPMENT

Blender, a pot large enough to boil 2 litres of water, a heat-proof container that can hold up to 1.5 litres of liquid, muslin cloth and sieve.

METHOD

1. Wash and rinse the soya beans thoroughly. Discard the discoloured ones.

2. Place the beans in a bowl and fill with 375ml of water. The beans should be covered with at least 5cm of water.

3. Soak the beans for five hours.

4. While waiting, prepare the sugar syrup. In a saucepan, add 50g of sugar and 50ml of water. Bring to a simmer and stir over low heat until the sugar is dissolved. Set aside to cool.

5. Rinse the beans again and discard the discoloured ones.

6. Place the beans in a colander or sieve to drain off excess water.

7. Place the beans in the blender.

8. Add 1 litre of water.

9. Blend for 1 1/2 minutes until the mixture is smooth.

10. Pour the mixture into the pot. Add the remaining 1 litre of water.

11. Turn on low heat and add the pandan leaves.

12. Skim off the foam and discard it.

13. Stir the mixture frequently over 20 to 25 minutes.

14. At the end, add the salt and let the mixture come to a gentle simmer and turn off the heat.

15. Discard the pandan leaves.

16. Line the sieve with the muslin cloth and use this to filter the soya bean milk into the heat-proof container.

17. When the remaining soya pulp has cooled, gently squeeze the muslin cloth to get more soya milk. You should be able to get 1.3 to 1.5 litres of milk.

18. Discard the pulp or save it for cooking such as making vegetarian patties or in stir-fries.

19. To serve, add sugar syrup to the cup before topping up with soya milk.

Serves three to four

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on May 15, 2020, with the headline Comfort Cooking: Homemade soya milk. Subscribe