Warm winter-spiced tiger nut milk

Makes 5-7 servings

To soak the tiger nuts

• 250g tiger nuts
• 700ml drinking water 

To make the milk

• 850ml drinking water
• ½ can (200ml) of 100% full fat coconut milk
• 5 pitted dates (ideally Medjool)
• 1 inch piece of ginger, cut into coins (you can leave unpeeled)

To warm and spice

• 2-3 cinnamon sticks (depending on size)
• 2-3 star aniseeds (to taste, would recommend starting with 2 then deciding if you want more potency)
• ½ tsp cloves
• ½ tsp coarse black pepper
• Pinch nutmeg
• 120ml drinking water
• Optional (I enjoy the flavour without): honey/sugar/brown sugar to taste 

1. In a covered pot/container, leave the tiger nuts to soak in the fridge overnight.
2. Rinse and drain the soaked tiger nuts.
3. Divide the soaked tiger nuts and milk ingredients roughly in half, so you can make two batches of milk to avoid overfilling your blender/food processor.
4. Blend together roughly half of the soaked tiger nuts and half of the remaining milk ingredients until blended thoroughly, with a slight grainy texture.
5. Using a large bowl and nut milk bag or cheesecloth (or a washed Aesop bag!), filter the liquid.
6. Repeat with the second batch, and combine the two batches of filtered milk.
7. Keep the (now flavoured!) husk/pulp for bulking up porridge or smoothies.
8. In a large saucepan, gently warm the milk on the lowest heat for around 7-10 minutes, stirring in all the spices. 
9. The mixture will thicken. Gently stir in the additional water to loosen slightly. Serve immediately. 

• See reels on IG (toyotastes) for visual aids.
• Tiger nuts are not actually nuts but tubers, so consider this for allergies. You can buy them from online suppliers if you can't find them in-store.
• Even after the soaking, the tiger nuts will still feel quite hard.
• Do check the tin to verify your coconut milk is 100% (not all are!) and full fat.
• Freeze the remaining coconut milk to use in porridge, a smoothie or a curry. Or you can double up this recipe (I’ve done so) to avoid having any leftover coconut milk from your tin. If you do decide to double up, you’ll have quite a bit of tiger nut milk, so refrigerate the pre-heated milk, and then only heat up as much of your tiger nut milk as you plan to consume at a time. Tiger nut milk can generally be kept refrigerated for up to 5 days.
• It is important to heat the milk slowly, on low heat. 
• It’s fine for the milk to thicken as its heating, if it's too thick for your liking for a drink even after adding the extra water, you can just add a bit more water until your desired consistency, though you might need to then add a little more spicing. 
• Alternatively, you can leave out the additional water, reduce it a bit further, and you’ll end up with a comforting custard-like pudding - indeed this is pretty close to a Ghanaian tiger nut pudding called Atadwe Milk.
• Whilst you won’t get quite the same flavour, you can buy premade tiger nut milk and skip straight to the warming and spicing over the stove, but of course I’d encourage you to try the more traditional method.