Ube Latte

An ube latte layers milk sweetened with ube, the purple yam of Filipino desserts, under a shot of espresso. Ube tastes mellow and sweet, somewhere between vanilla, nut and sweet potato, and its colour turns the milk violet. The coffee is there to cut the sweetness, so the best versions keep it to one double shot and a modest amount of ube.

Origin & Story

What ube is

Ube (pronounced oo-beh) is a purple yam, Dioscorea alata, a tuber native to Southeast Asia and most closely tied to Filipino cooking. It is often confused with taro, but the two are different plants: taro (Colocasia esculenta) is a corm in another family, with white or speckled flesh and an earthier, more neutral taste, and it is used more in savoury dishes. Ube flesh is purple right through and tastes sweet and mellow, with a vanilla-like, slightly nutty character.

In the Philippines ube is mostly a dessert ingredient. Its best-known form is ube halaya, a thick jam of cooked ube with milk and sugar, and it also goes into ice cream, cakes, breads and the shaved-ice dessert halo-halo.

From dessert to latte

The ube latte is a modern café drink rather than a Filipino tradition. It grew with the wider popularity of ube desserts in the United States and across Asia, helped by social media, where the colour photographs well. Outside Southeast Asia fresh ube is hard to find, so cafés and home cooks use ube halaya, frozen grated ube, ube powder, or ube extract, a concentrated flavouring and colour.

Halaya, powder or extract

Each gives a different drink. Halaya gives the most genuine flavour and body, but it is sweet, so it doubles as the sweetener. Powder is milder and needs blending to dissolve. Extract is strong, bright purple and mostly flavouring; a few drops make the milk vivid but can taste artificial if you use it for the whole flavour. A good compromise is halaya for flavour and one or two drops of extract if you want the colour.

Why it works with coffee

Ube is sweet and soft rather than sharp, so on its own in milk it can taste flat. Espresso adds bitterness and roast, the same job coffee does in a mocha. Poured on top of an iced ube milk, the shot also layers: violet at the bottom, white in the middle, dark brown on top. Stir it before drinking.

Making it at home

Blend the ube halaya with cold milk until completely smooth; stirring alone leaves flecks. Pour it over ice and float the espresso on top. For a hot version, warm the ube milk gently, then steam or froth it; ube milk scorches more easily than plain milk because of the sugar and starch, so keep it under 65°C.

Reading the Flavor Profile

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