These Filipino ube desserts will dress up your dessert table and impress everyone at the same time. And the best part is that it's good for you too!
If you want to add a touch of color and delicious flavor, just add ube!
As a Filipino-American, I grew up enjoying ube treats. Treats made with this Filipino purple yam are staples at Filipino bakeries. And now, I love using ube in my home cooking and baking.
Ube is iconic ingredient in Filipino cooking, especially desserts. Most people love both the eye-catching colors and the sugary-sweet flavor. It tastes like white chocolate with notes coconut and pistachio.
There are so many creative ways to bake with it - and I'll share some of my favorite recipes.
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🇵🇭 What is ube?
Ube is a purple yam that's grown natively in the Philippines.
It's pronounced oo-bay and the outside is brown - like typical sweet potatoes - and the inside is a bold purple color. Ube is known for both it's color and it's flavor.
What does ube taste like? Well, it does kind of taste like a sweet potato, but also has a vanilla and coconut flavor that's mildly nutty. It's so delicious!
Both the way it looks and tastes makes it a popular ingredient in Filipino cuisine. There are a lot of ways to cook with it, but we usually bake with it. And most people prefer to make sweet treats with it.
🍽 Serving ideas
Since ube is usually baked in desserts, I'll share some of my favorite sweet ube recipes below. The sweetness of ube desserts makes them pair perfectly with almost any other dessert you make.
To make the sweet and nutty flavors of these ube flavors stand out, make some traditional savory Filipino recipes.
Filipino macaroni salad has sugary-sweet pineapples mixed with savory chicken and eggs. Filipino pork BBQ is sweetened with brown sugar and smothered in salty soy sauce and zesty calamani juice.
And if you want to serve these ube desserts with more sweets, then make Filipino turon banana lampia. It's basically banana and jackfruit fried in lumpia wrappers, and it's an incredible classic Filipino dessert!
👩🏻🍳 Ube FAQs
Store ube halaya in an airtight container and keep it in the refrigerator. For the best results, use it completely within two weeks.
While it’s true that Hawaiians enjoy eating ube, it originated in the Philippines. So it’s a Filipino food. In fact, ube was introduced to Hawaii by Filipino immigrants.
No, ube doesn’t grow very well in the US. The best place to buy ube in the United States will be in Filipino and Asian grocery stores. You might find frozen and, rarely, some fresh ube for sale.
Ube is a purple yam. Taro is also purple, but it’s an entirely different food. It’s a starchy tube vegetable that isn’t as sweet as ube. Other than the flavor, the other big difference between them is the color. Ube is dark purple, almost neon. Taro is light purple, almost white.
💜 Best Ube Desserts
Filipino Ube Desserts
This is a fun way to add color and flavor to your breakfast! You can adjust this recipe to make cakes, waffles, and even pancakes. But if you’re craving a sweet snack, you can’t get better than these sweet donuts.
If you know how to make homemade cake, then you can make these. The homemade yellow cake filling is coated in a bright purple mixture that’s made with ube condensed milk. Then, I added coconut flakes to give it some crunch! You could also make ube cupcakes with this recipe - just add the coating on top.
This frozen treat is a traditional Filipino dessert. It’s made with 5 simple ingredients, including ube jam, milk, and cream. It’s naturally gluten-free and full of incredible vitamins and minerals. Plus, you can make it dairy-free with coconut cream and coconut milk, too!
This is a fun twist on basic chocolate chip cookies. They’re made with classic cookie ingredients, but with the addition of ube extract and white chocolate chips. And the ube jam balances out the textures to make them perfectly chewy.
🍳 Kitchen tools and equipment
Ready to make these recipes? Here are the kitchen tools and equipment you'll need:
🇵🇭 More Filipino recipes
Did you make any of these recipes? Don't forget to leave a 5-Star 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 rating and comment below letting us know which one you made and how it turned out. Thank you!
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