User:Elontok/Halo-halo

Halo-halo, officially spelled haluhalo, Tagalog for "mix-mix", is a popular cold dessert in the Philippines made up of crushed ice, evaporated milk or coconut milk, and various ingredients including: ube jam (ube halaya), sweetened kidney or garbanzo beans, coconut strips, sago, gulaman (agar), pinipig, boiled taro or soft yams in cubes, slices or portions of fruit preserves and other root crop preserves, flan, and often topped with a scoop of ube ice cream. It is normally prepared in a tall clear glass and served with a long spoon. Halo-halo is considered to be the unofficial national dessert of the Philippines. The term "halo-halo" literally means "mix-mix" in English because the dessert is meant to be mixed before it is consumed. By extension, this spelling has come to describe any object or situation that is composed of a similar, colorful mélange of ingredients.

History[edit]
The origin of halo-halo is traced to the pre-war Japanese Filipinos and the Japanese kakigōri class of desserts. One of the earliest versions of halo-halo was a dessert known locally as monggo kon-yelo or mongo-ya which consisted of only mung beans (Tagalog: monggo or munggo, used in place of red azuki beans from Japan), boiled and cooked in syrup (minatamis na monggo), served on top of crushed ice with milk and sugar. Over time, more native ingredients were added, resulting in the creation and development of the modern halo-halo. One difference between halo-halo and its Japanese ancestor is the placement of ingredients mostly under the ice instead of on top of it. The original monggo kon-yelo type can still be found today along with similar variations using sweet corn (mais kon-yelo) or saba bananas (saba kon-yelo).

Some authors specifically attribute halo-halo to the 1920s or 1930s Japanese migrants in the Quinta Market of Quiapo, Manila, due to its proximity to the Insular Ice Plant, which was Quiapo's main ice supply. The Insular Ice Plant was built in 1902 by the Americans.

The spelling of "halo-halo" is considered to be incorrect by the Commission on the Filipino Language, which prescribes "haluhalo". The word is an adjective meaning "mixed [together]" in Tagalog, a reduplication of the Tagalog verb halo "to mix".

Description[edit]
There is no correct set of ingredients for halo-halo as the ingredients can vary widely, but the dessert usually includes sugar palm fruit (kaong), coconut sport (macapuno), saba plantains cooked in syrup (minatamis na saging), jackfruit (langkâ), agar jellies (gulaman), tapioca pearls, nata de coco, sweet potato (kamote), sweetened beans, cheese, pounded toasted young rice (pinipig), and ice cream. The ingredients are placed in specific positions; the fruit, beans and other sweets are placed at the bottom, followed by shaved ice and is then topped with either a combination of leche flan, ube halaya (mashed purple yam) or ice cream. Evaporated milk or coconut milk is poured into the mixture upon serving.[citation needed]

A similar Visayan dessert binignit, commonly called bilo-bilo, is also referred to as "ginataang halo-halo" in Tagalog ("halo-halo in coconut milk"), commonly shortened to "ginataan". It is made with mostly the same ingredients, although the latter is usually served hot.

In popular culture[edit]
Halo-halo was featured in the second episode of the first season of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown when its host Anthony Bourdain visited a Jollibee branch, a Filipino fast-food restaurant, in Los Angeles. Bourdain praised the dessert and posted a photo of the dessert on his Twitter account, which he captioned, "oddly beautiful." The dessert was featured again in the fifth episode of the seventh season when Bourdain learns how the dessert is made.

Halo-halo was also featured as a Quickfire Challenge dish in the seventh episode of the fourth season of the American reality television series, Top Chef. Filipino-American contestant Dale Talde, prepared the dessert which featured avocado, mango, kiwifruit, and nuts. Talde then was named as one of the top three Quickfire Challenge dishes by guest judge Johnny Iuzzinni of Jean Georges. Talde also made the dish in a later episode. Buko halo, a combination of halo-halo and buko salad, usually served directly on coconut shells

The dessert was featured on a Delicious Destinations edition episode of Bizarre Foods.

Halo-halo can be found in Filipino fast-food restaurants like Jollibee, Max's, and Chowking.

See also[edit]
Shaved ice § Regions, for similar shaved ice variations around the world.


 * Kakigōri: Japanese shaved ice
 * Bingsu: Korean shaved ice
 * Tshuah-ping: Taiwanese shaved ice
 * Es campur and Es teler: Indonesian shaved ice
 * Namkhaeng sai: Thai shaved ice
 * Ais Kacang (ABC): Malaysian shaved ice
 * Grattachecca: Italian shaved ice popular in Rome.
 * Hawaiian shave ice: Hawaiian shaved ice
 * Falooda: Indian cold dessert
 * Chè: Vietnamese sweet beverage

Other Filipino Cold Desserts:


 * Mais kon-yelo
 * Saba kon-yelo
 * Iskrambol
 * Ice buko

Edit summary: copied from Halo-halo

Edit: removed reference number 5 - twitter photo