Winter melon punch
Winter melon punch, also called Winter Melon “Tea” in east Asia, is a sweetened fruit drink with a very distinctive taste. Winter melon punch can be found at many stores and street vendors. The preparation process itself is very simple and inexpensive, making this folk beverage extremely popular in homes as well as on the streets; however, culinary artists who seek the very genuine and traditional method and recipe of making this seemingly ordinary household drink have spent many efforts, and they did make their names.
Ingredients
Being the title of the punch, the winter melon is a must. To begin with, one should check whether the melon picked is plump enough to hold sufficient flesh and juice. The winter melon is then later on peeled, sliced, and its seeds are completely removed. The winter melon slices are stirred and cooked in boiling water with brown sugar and caramel for many hours. This mixture of soup will be filtered by net or gauze, ridding it of the dregs and impurities. Once the clean, brown liquid cools completely, it is then refrigerated, canned and sold as concentrated winter melon punch. It can also be dehydrated and cut into solid cubes known and sold as winter melon punch cubes.
Preparation
To prepare your own winter melon punch, you can either shop for winter melon, sugar and caramel to do it the traditional but hard way, or simply just purchase a chunk of winter melon punch cube to make it the lazy but much easier way. Boil the cube, whether you bought it or made it, in hot water. The recommended proportion is 600 grams of cube with 4.5 to 5 liters of water. After the cube finally dissolves, boil the soup for another 20 to 30 minutes, and then cool the mixture to room temperature before you store it in the refrigerator. An alternative way to prepare the punch is not from the cube, but from the liquid concentrate. You may either buy the concentrate from shops and vendors, or simply make your own concentrate from the cube by boiling it in 800 milliliters of water. The concentrate can usually be stored for a week under refrigeration or as long as a month in a freezer. Make a 1 in 6 dilution whenever you want to drink the punch.
Variations
Different flavors of winter melon punch appear throughout Taiwan. People may add lemon juice, oolong tea or many other drinks to it according to their preferences to make mixed drinks or even cocktails. To transfer this popular beverage into snack food, many street vendors add tapioca balls, nata de coco, or tangyuan to winter melon punch and sell it in bowls. A sugar free version of the winter melon punch is made for patients suffering from nephropathy and diabetes. In this variation, the cooking process is the same except that only the melon slices and water are boiled to make the mixture. Some may even soak the winter melon slices in lime or calcium hydroxide to “preserve the melon’s original flavor” by hardening their flesh before boiling them with sugar, caramel and water.