Purple Sweet Potato Tapioca Pudding (Sago)

4.80 from 5 votes

Servings: 4

Author: Lisa Lin

This tapioca pudding gets its beautiful lavender hue from Hawaiian sweet potatoes. It’s a refreshing dessert that’s easy to make and it’s not too sweet!

This recipe serves 4 to 6 but you can easily double up the recipe to serve more people. You can also halve the recipe to make a smaller batch. If you plan to halve the recipe, I recommend cooking the tapioca pearls with 5 cups of water. When I tested a half batch, I found that 4 cups of water was not enough.

I like adding sliced strawberries to the pudding for some sweet and slightly tart flavor. Feel free to use whatever fruits you like.

Prep Time15

Cook Time45

Chilling Time2

Ingredients

8 cups (1.97kg) water, plus more for steaming sweet potatoes
3/4 cup (155g) small tapioca pearls, (see note 1)
1 pound (455g) Hawaiian purple sweet potatoes, (see note 2)
1 cup (230g) whole or low-fat milk, can sub with oat milk
1 cup (225g) full-fat canned coconut milk, (see note 3 on what to do with leftover coconut milk)
5 tablespoons honey, divided (can sub with sugar or maple syrup)
1 1/4 to 1/2 cups (165g to 200g) sliced strawberries

Instructions

Cook Pearls

Add the water to a pot or large saucepan and bring it to boil over high heat. DO NOT add the tapioca pearls when the water is still cold (see note 4). Reduce the heat slightly to medium-high and add the tapioca pearls. Give the pearls a quick stir. Cook the pearls for 15 minutes and turn off the heat. The pearls will be translucent around the exterior with solid white specks in the center. Cover the pot with a lid and let the pearls sit for another 10 to 15 minutes, until the pearls look completely translucent. It’s okay if a few pearls here and there still have tiny white specks in the center.
Drain the pearls and rinse them under cold water. Transfer them to a large bowl with ice water or cold tap water. Submerging the pearls completely in cold water helps them to cool faster and makes them less sticky. Let that sit while you prepare the other components of the tapioca pudding.

Steam Sweet Potatoes

Add a steaming rack into the center of a large wok. Fill the wok with water, until the water level nearly reaches the top of the steaming rack. Cover the wok and bring the water to boil. If you have an alternate steaming setup, feel free to use that!
Place the sweet potatoes on a plate, set the plate on top of the steaming rack, and cover the wok. Steam the sweet potatoes for 25 to 30 minutes, until you can easily pierce the flesh with a fork. You can speed up the steaming process by slicing the sweet potatoes before steaming.
Let the sweet potatoes cool slightly before peeling them. You’ll need about 3/4 cup (200g) of mashed sweet potatoes, which is about 2 medium-sized sweet potatoes. Save the rest of the cooked sweet potatoes and slice them into bite-sized cubes.

Make Puree

Heat the milk and coconut milk in a saucepan. Do not cover the saucepan with a lid as the milk boils over very easily. Right when the milk comes to a boil, turn off the heat. This step of boiling the milk isn’t absolutely necessary but it maintains the vibrancy of the puree for a longer period. (See note 4 for the full reasoning.) Add 3 tablespoons of honey, stir, and let the milk cool for 5 to 10 minutes.
Pour the milk into the bowl of a high-speed blender. Add the mashed sweet potatoes and blend everything until smooth. The puree will taste very sweet at this stage, so wait until you add the tapioca pearls before assessing the overall sweetness of the pudding.

Finish Tapioca Pudding

Drain the cooled tapioca pearls and transfer to a large bowl. Drizzle 2 tablespoons of honey over the pearls. Toss to coat the pearls with the honey. If you accidentally added all 5 tablespoons of the honey into the warmed milk, don’t worry. Just skip the honey at this stage.
Add the sweet potato puree to the bowl and stir to incorporate. Finally, add the cubed sweet potato and sliced strawberries and stir again.
You can eat the purple sweet potato tapioca pudding right away. However, I find pudding more refreshing after it’s been chilled for at least 1 to 2 hours. Feel free to serve it at your preferred temperature. Serve the tapioca pudding in bowls, wide mouth mason jars, or glasses!

Notes

Small Tapioca Pearls: You can usually find small tapioca pearls in Asian grocery stores. Bob’s Red Mill also produces these tapioca pearls. Use their store finder to find a grocery store that sells them.
Purple Sweet Potatoes: For the puree, I like to use Hawaiian (or Okinawan) purple sweet potatoes with pale yellow skins. I find that Hawaiian purple sweet potatoes have better flavor than the ones with orange/brown skins, like the Stokes purple sweet potato. I usually find Hawaiian purple sweet potatoes in Asian grocery stores.
Leftover Coconut Milk: If you opened a can of coconut milk for this recipe, you'll likely have some leftover. Here's my post on ways you can use leftover coconut milk!
Do Not Add Tapioca Pearls to Cold Water: The tapioca pearls will melt together if you add them when the water is cold or insufficiently heated through. Wait until the water boils before adding the pearls.
Why I Boil the Milk: It’s not completely necessary to boil the milk. However, when developing the recipe for my mango tapioca pudding, I noticed that the batches made with unboiled milk started to turn gray after a few hours. However, the mango puree tended to hold its golden color better when I used boiled milk. If you want to maintain the lilac hue of the puree for an extended period, boil the milk. That said, every since I published this recipe, I discovered that I’m quite lazy and often skip this step of boiling the milk. Instead, I simply blend milk (straight from the fridge), chilled coconut milk (I leave the can in the fridge overnight), honey or sugar, and fresh mango. Then, I mix the puree with cooked tapioca pearls and serve immediately. Note: If the chilled coconut milk turns solid, blend the milk with an immersion blender or a high-speed blender before making the puree.
Why I Don’t Roast the Sweet Potatoes: I tried roasting the sweet potatoes during one of my test batches, and the roasting process browned the sweet potatoes too much. You need the sweet potatoes to look vibrant purple to give the puree its nice lavender color.

Nutrition

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