Frequently Asked Questions About Buko Pandan Salad

It is a fruit salad made with young coconut and pandan-flavored agar-agar. It may also contain nata de coco, sago, and kaong, a chewy fruit from sugar palm trees.

The sauce is made with cream and condensed milk. I like using cream cheese to make a thick and creamy sauce.

According to Wikipedia, what we know as pandan is also called screwpine or pandanus amaryllifolius.

Pandan doesn't have a specific taste. Most people use it for its grassy, nutty flavor and green color.

It is overpowering in a good way. You have to bruise the skin and cook them to extract their wonderful aroma.

Pandan is a tropical plant found in South East Asia. It grows everywhere in the Philippines. In the US, you can sometimes buy fresh pandan leaves in Asian grocery stores.

You're likely to find frozen pandan leaves and pandan extracts or essences in cans or small bottles.

The combination of pandan and coconut is the best for both sweet and savory preparations. It's also good with mango, lychee, banana, lemongrass, and dairy. It's amazing even with just cooked rice.

The plant itself isn't fragrant. To obtain their unique flavor and light green hue, you must bruise or crush the leaves and cook them.

Buko or young coconut is a fruit that belongs to the palm family of Arecaceae. It has a green outer husk that contains sweet clear liquid and jelly flesh encased in a hard brown shell. It is harvested before it is fully mature.

Buko is sweet and tender from coconuts harvested before they mature. It is also called "young coconut."

Buko juice is the coconut water that we all know. It's the clear liquid that comes from inside a coconut.

No, it doesn't have gelatin. Nata de coco or coconut gel is mainly coconut water, fermented with some bacteria, and washed off with acetic acid.

Tapioca is made from cassava plants, while sago is made from tropical palm trees. They are both chewy and cooked in a similar way.

Soak them in cold water. Or better yet, keep them in simple syrup until ready to use. Simple syrup is made by boiling equal parts of water and sugar.

If they are already clumped together, rinse them under hot tap water. Use a fork to separate them.

Agar-agar is vegetarian or plant-based gelatin made from red algae or seaweed. It acts as a thickener and stabilizer. They are also available in flakes, bars, and strands.

Agar-agar shouldn't take long to set. If it doesn't solidify, you must have added too much water or not enough agar-agar.

To fix this, you can remelt it in a saucepan and add more water or agar-agar as necessary.

Smell it — is it off or funky? Inspect it — is it slimy or foamy? Do you see any molds? Has the color changed?

These are the things to consider. As much as we hate to waste food, sometimes we just have to let go to save ourselves.

Buko pandan should be stored in the refrigerator and consumed within three days to maintain its flavor and texture.

I wouldn’t recommend freezing buko pandan salad. When thawed, it gets watery and the sago loses its chewy texture. If you must freeze to extend the shelf life, make sure to mix it well after thawing.