Ever since we started on our daily 15:9 intermittent fast last June, we’ve found ourselves eating less and gradually losing weight. One of the issues (or perhaps it’s a feature?) of our routine is that we sometimes feel quite full from lunch, and don’t have much appetite for our early dinner.
This poses quite a dilemma, because skipping dinner raises the risk of us getting so hungry later in the night that we end up having a snack before bedtime. Which would impede the metabolic switching that makes intermittent fasting effective.
We’ve managed to find a solution to this, namely warm purple milk. It may not sound particularly appetising, but it’s actually a great comfort food that tastes good, fills the stomach and keeps you feeling nice and warm inside.
The Wife makes two variations of this drink, a dark purple version and a light purple version.
Purple sweet potatoes are used in the dark purple version. They’re readily available from our wet market downstairs, or in supermarkets like NTUC and Cold Storage. Our fresh milk of choice is the Meiji 4.3 Deluxe, commonly referred to simply as “Meiji Red” and easily found throughout the island.
It’s the same milk that I use for our occasional flat whites, which I make using our Nespresso Creatista Plus. The steam wand of the machine comes in quite handy, heating up the milk and introducing microfoam to give it a creamy texture, all at the touch of a button.
We’ve tried different proportions of sweet potato to milk and found that it works best with a 1-to-0.7 ratio. That is, 300gm of sweet potato to 210gm of milk, which I weigh out precisely using my trusty timer scale that I use daily for our morning pourover coffee.
To make the drink, start by peeling the sweet potatoes and chopping them up into rough chunks. Steam them for around 15 minutes and while they cool, weigh and heat up the milk. Finally, dump everything into a heat-resistant jug, whizz it all up with an immersion hand-blender and enjoy.
No added sugar is needed, because sweet potatoes are, well, sweet.
The first time The Wife made it, there was an alluring rose undernote. Unfortunately, she’s been unable to replicate it, even after many subsequent attempts. It must have been that particular batch of Indonesian sweet potatoes, which have not made a repeat appearance since.
For the light purple version, replace the sweet potatoes with yam. Repeat the same process as above, but you’ll need to add honey (or sugar) at the end to achieve your desired level of sweetness. One thing to note when handling raw yams is that they might cause itchiness, so you might want to wear gloves when handling them.
The yam version was inspired by similar drinks found in Taiwanese street food stalls, where steaming hunks of locally-grown Dajia (大甲) yam are blended up right in-front of you.
Our homemade version is nice, but can’t compare with those that we’ve had in Taiwan because it’s difficult to find the same yams here. But when Taiwanese borders are closed to tourists, it’s as good as it gets.
The two purple drinks are quite easy and quick to whip up, and are particularly comforting on a cold and rainy day. So, why not give them a try?
