My childhood was a difficult time for my family. But for me, it is the things that teach about a lot of beauty that are very useful for my life now.
Difficult times, especially when there was a shortage of food ingredients, it made me learn to process simple food ingredients into delicious food that created happiness for us as a family.
This time I will bring you to enjoy about coconut. You could say in my area is coconut heaven. We can easily have a large supply of coconuts under various conditions.
We utilize coconut from various coconut conditions. Starting from a young coconut, to mature coconut to take coconut milk and use coconut meat for toppings, especially coconut flakes, dried or fresh.
It's not just coconut water which is super fresh. Coconut meat also gives us many advantages.
We often mix grated coconut with other vegetables which are then steamed, to make delicious side dishes.
For toppings, we usually steam grated coconut sprinkled with a little salt. After that, we use steamed grated coconut as a topping for various traditional dishes, which are mostly sweet and savory.
Coconut Flakes
Apart from grated coconut, coconut flakes are processed products of mature coconut that we are familiar with.
Dried coconut flakes can also be reprocessed as a snack. Children also love this with the color variations added to the coconut flakes.
This time I will share the process of how I make sun-dried coconut. I use the natural way without a dryer to save on electricity costs.
Getting Old Coconut
Old coconut has thick flesh, and if grated it will produce a lot of thick coconut milk.
The old coconut that I have this time has a small embryo that looks yellow. It is derived from the part of the coconut that will soon sprout to later be used as a new tree seed.
This time I only used half the coconut. Meanwhile, I will use the other half to cook a side dish that requires coconut milk as an ingredient.
Then, I scrape off the coconut meat slowly with a knife. Please be careful that it doesn't hurt the hands. It takes energy and precision.
After getting the coconut flakes, clean the remnants of the black part of the coconut shell that would normally stick to the coconut flakes.
I used a food shears to clean the tough black part.
After getting the desired portion of coconut flakes, I put the coconut flakes in the container. It's better to put a traditional container made of bamboo. Unfortunately, my bamboo container is damaged. So I used an existing container.
Take advantage of the hot sun
I was lucky this time the sun was shining brightly. So I dried the coconut flakes in direct sunlight.
I only used it all day since morning. You can use it for about 3 days to a week depending on the level of dryness of the coconut flakes you want.
This is the result of a day drying coconut flakes. After this, it can be fried without oil to give off a more fragrant aroma but this is optional.
Usually, I use these sun-dried coconut flakes as a topping for smoothies, as a garnish for desserts when plating, or cook them with brown sugar to make caramelized dried coconut which is delicious as a healthy snack.
Dried coconut flakes are considered a healthy snack as a healthy source as well as a source of energy and help keep the immune system in top shape.
That's how I made sun-dried coconut flakes. I hope you enjoy my activities this time. This is quite satisfying for me when preparing coconut meat into coconut flakes.
This activity is suitable for those of you who have free time, and of course your love for ingredients, especially coconut.
Thank you for reading my blog and reblog if you want my blog this time worthy of reading by others.
Best Regards,
Anggrek Lestari
Anggrek Lestari is an Indonesian fiction writer who has published two major books. Now She is a full-time content creator. She has a goal to share life, poem, and food content that makes others happy and can get inspiration.
Contact Person: authoranggreklestari@gmail.com
Discord: anggreklestari#3009