Agbalumo Drink - Version 2

The large bottle of the agbalumo drink from yesterday's post didn't last long, so I decided to make more. I also thought if I could improve on it. Because I had read about using sugarcane instead of granulated sugar, I wanted to use it this time round.

Fresh sugarcane already peeled

The sugarcane cut into cubes

Sugarcane is not as sweet as regular sugar, so I was ready to use the lot, if necessary.




I also decided to use fresh ginger instead of ground and forget about the vanilla. And I wondered how it would turn out if I cut up the agbalumo really small and removing the seeds and then chopping it fine in my food processor!

Two finger lengths of fresh ginger

Ready to be pureed

The idea being to extract as much goodness from the fruit as possible!






So I started to process the fruit. But the machine was rattling and shaking in a terrible way. So I added some of the water used in the recipe. That was better but still not right. More water and medium speed for 3 minutes. Then I added some of the cubed sugarcane and the ginger and run the processor at full speed. It didn't chop the sugarcane at all, only the ginger. By now the motor was too hot to continue, so I poured the lot into a large pot and added the remaining water, forgetting the cardamom. Then I proceeded like before, bring it all to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. After 10 minutes I tasted for sugar and found that it wasn't sweet at all, so I added 1 cup of sugar to the brew and finished the cooking process. While it was still simmering I noticed that the colour was  more translucent rather than opaque like the previous batch. Note to self: fresh ginger is preferable to ground ginger! Next came the cooling and draining as before.

The mushy fruit  and solid sugarcane

This was a serious lesson in what not to do when preparing agbalumo! DO NOT USE YOUR FOOD PROCESSOR!!! As I mentioned in the last post, the fruit has a certain gummyness. And it promptly deposited all of its gum onto the interior of the processor bowl. It took almost 3 days of hard labor to get rid of the stickiness, the last bit had to be removed with nail varnish remover! It was sticky like when you pull a label off a bottle, if you can picture what I mean!

Next: DO NOT USE SUGARCANE THE WAY I DID. It is a total waste of perfectly good sugarcane because it cannot release its sweetness that way. Only use it if you have someone who can juice it beforehand.

And do not forget the cardamom! 

But cutting it small and removing the seeds is my choice from now on because it does intensify the flavour. Otherwise use the recipe as before.

Better colour than previous

CHEERS!

I hope everyone had a good giggle! Till next time