Pink horchata: Aka cebada

 

What is cebada 

We are back again talking about another Salvadoran drink and today we have cebada, but I call it the pink horchata even though it does not have the same flavor as horchata. cebada is a strawberry-flavored pink drink. Fresco de cebada translates to English as fresh barley but its misleading since there is no barley within it. Cebada is made from water, spices such as cloves and cinnamon, flour and sugar. The strawberry flavor comes from vanilla and strawberry extract. 

How to make cebada 

Normally I recommend making cebada out of the powder mixture sold by Rio Grande Foods,  but today we will make it from scratch so bear with me it will be a fun and interesting process in making cebada. 

Ingredients: 

- 1L of Water                                     - 1 cinnamon stick 

- Allspice berries 5                            - cloves 5 

- 1/4 cup of bread or rice flour          - 2 tbsp vanilla essence 

- 2 tbsp strawberry                            - a pinch of salt 

- sugar, to taste      

Step 1:

Boil the water with the cinnamon and cloves for 10 minutes. As the cinnamon and cloves are boiling you are going to do the following: dissolve the 1/4 cup of flour in a cup of water. Once it has been dissolved add it to the boiling water and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly for 5 minutes 

Step 2: 

after doing all of that turn off the heat and let it cool slightly. Add the vanilla and strawberry extracts, add more water only if the mixture is too thick, and add sugar to your desired level of sweetness and place in the fridge so that it can cool down before serving it. 

Voila, another delicious drink made by your own hands. You should be proud.