You might recognize me from the show Worth It,

where I'm usually tasting foods at different price points

with my pals, Steven and Adam.

In this video, I'm going to be making one

of my favorite things I ever had on Worth It, soy milk.

Not just any soy milk, but the freshly made soy milk

we had Liu Jia Suasian bao

in our dumpling episode in Taiwan.

Having that soy milk was a real holy crap moment for me.

What? - Jeez

- I didn't know that's what soy milk supposed to taste like.

I had never tasted freshly made soy milk before.

My previous experience was just having

the store bought stuff.

After having that soy milk,

I felt like such an idiot because I thought I knew

what soy milk tasted like, but then I had this

and I was like, yeah, of course there is great,

delicious, rich, tasting soy milk.

I think making this recipe will help me explore something

that I'm really interested in,

which is the fundamentals of why something tastes good.

Holy (beeping).

Soy milk is one of those food things that seems very simple

and singular, kind of like butter,

but it has this incredible potential for flavor

that is actually very nuanced and complex.

So to start off, I'm gonna be speaking with Ms Liu

and Inca, who was also on that trip with us.

So nice to see you again.

(speaking foreign language)

- Yeah, a long time no see, Andrew

- Yeah and Inca, thank you as well

for joining me on this call.

Inca, I want to start by asking you a question.

I remember when we were filming at Ms. Liu's

you were so excited.

Inca, how's the soy milk?

- I'm like almost done with it, (laughing).

I really like soy milk, this is really good.

- And I was wondering if you could just talk

about your experience with what you might find in Taiwan.

- Soy milk, I feel like in Taiwan especially,

it's just like such a common drink, you know.

It's like something that you enjoy by itself.

And also there's so much you can do with soy milk.

Tofu, tofu pudding, dried bean curd,

and of our most famous desserts tofu pudding

is made with soy milk.

- How would you describe the flavor of great soy milk?

(speaking foreign language)

- You know, you're shop has a relatively small menu.

I was wondering why it's also important for you

to offer this freshly made soy milk at this shop as well?

(speaking foreign language)

(laughing)

- Thank you again, Ms Liu for sharing with me

and talking to me.

(speaking foreign language)

- All right. So we've got our ingredients,

which it turns out is just soybean, water,

and then a little sugar to sweeten it when it's done.

Which makes me scared because my experience,

every time I've had to make a recipe

where the ingredient list is very short,

it usually goes horribly wrong.

I have to thank Ms Liu.

She actually adapted the recipe that they use

in her restaurant to a home version and tested that for me.

Oh, Oh God.

I mean, is it stupid to say that it just smells like a bean,

like a green bean.

God!

500 grams of soybeans.

Our first step is to wash and soak these for six hours.

So here we have our soaked soybeans.

What's interesting is that they go from being balls

to being more of a traditional bean shape.

It just occurred to me that I have no idea

what a soybean plant looks like.

Hmm?

Yeah, It looks like a lot of other beans

and I've had edamame before, of course.

So I'm going to strain this water off.

Put this back in the pot here.

I'm now adding six cups of water,

and then we're going to blend these soybeans.

This is the part that might go wrong for me.

Ms Liu had a nice high powered blender.

I'm using my Stick Wonder again, so.

Also I haven't tasted a soybean

because I was doing some other research.

It could really upset your stomach, possibly hurt you

eating the uncooked soybean.

But you know what I just noticed,

these soybeans look like a pot of Yukon Gold potatoes.

Can we get a shot of that real quick?

It's crazy how much a single soybean looks like a potato.

Just kidding, that was a potato.

But look at these soybeans.

doesn't it look like a pot of potatoes from really far away.

Oh Come on, come on.

That was good, right?

Nice potato trick.

(blender whirring)

Ms Liu does this for several minutes.

So I think I really need to get like a fine,

fine grain paste inside of here.

(sniffing)

It already smells really good in it's blended state.

It has like a delightful,

like enticing frothiness to it.

Here we have our soy milk ground up slurry.

So Ms Liu has these filter bags that she pours

all of her ground up soybeans into.

I was only able to find cheese cloth,

but I saw other recipes using cheese cloth.

So it should be fine,

it also feels appropriate to use cheesecloth

because this method is very similar

to the method that's used to make tofu.

I believe the only difference is that you would use

a coagulating agent.

And making tofu is therefore a lot like making cheese.

Okay. (soft music)

It's actually really not pouring through as quickly

as I thought it would.

Oh, I overfilled my satchel here a little bit.

Trying really hard to get all this stuff out.

It's such a dense blob right now.

There's a lot more water to extract from here,

but you really gotta squeeze hard.

Now going to take these ground soybeans,

drop them into a side bowl.

The color is actually very pretty.

It's very buttery, so that was a third of the soybeans.

I'm gonna try to do a little less.

I think I'll have an easier time squeezing out.

So now that we've done the first squeeze,

Ms. Liu suggests adding another three cups of water

to the ground soybean to extract even more liquid

from this ground soybean.

(Andrew chugging)

(Andrew exhaling)

Give this a quick stir.

I don't know if it's just the sunset lighting over here,

but I'm finding this an incredibly relaxing experience.

Something about cheesecloth that just kind of conveys

a rustic cooking process kind of vibe.

Coarse materials are very cozy.

Okay we've strained our soy milk and now it's time to boil.

(upbeat music)

Welcome to the stove area.

So I've cleaned this second pot

and the next step is actually to transfer all

of the squeezed soy milk liquid

into the second pot.

And then I have a residue in the first pot

that's supposed to brown a little bit, not burn,

but just brown and then that flavor will impart

into the rest of the soy milk.

Most of the liquid has evaporated.

I'm starting to see a little browning.

I really don't want to burn this.

Mm, yeah, it's getting kind of

like a toasted popcorn smell to it.

I'm pouring it now.

(milk splashes)

Okay, actually supposed to use a whisk.

I'm gonna turn this down a little bit

because I feel the soy milk that charred

on the bottom is still there.

I see that there's some kind of like toasted solids

that are now kind of floating around.

They're also on my whisk.

I don't think that's too big of a concern

because we're actually going to put this through

the cheesecloth again after it boils.

Oh my God, (laughing).

Very nearly had a disaster on my hands.

Okay, the soy milk is boiled.

Pour the milk back through my cheesecloth.

So this seems to have taken out most of the charred bits.

And now just going to return this to a boil.

(upbeat music)

Okay, the soy milk is now boiling.

The last ingredient is just a little bit of sugar

to sweeten the deal.

Soy milk is often enjoyed hot, but I want to have it

as close to the experience that I had at Ms. Liu's

back in Taiwan, which was cool.

I'll chill it in the refrigerator overnight.

And tomorrow we may taste. (classical music)

I made a lot of soy milk, (laughing).

This is a, especially in this jar,

I kind of feel like a milkman.

Right, so I think there's not much else to do,

but to, you know.

There's a lot of condensation happening here.

I think it's just time to have some soy milk.

There's something very pleasing about a glass of milk.

Okay,

cheers.

Wow.

Tastes really good.

Hold on, let's uh, (laughing).

It's very good.

I think I'm very pleased and relieved

that I didn't royally screw this up.

But it was a very simple method.

It has a very pleasant thickness to it.

It really tastes like a full fat product.

So out of curiosity, I actually bought some

store-bought soy milk to do a side by side.

Way less fragrant in this store bought one.

The visual viscosity between these seems to be the same.

You know, they seem equally liquid-y.

Yet, this one tastes so much thinner than mine.

All right, so there's my soy milk.

I had a lot of fun making this.

Thank you again so much to Ms Liu for guiding me

through this process.

It kind of changes your whole perspective

on what a thing is.

All foods have a similar potential,

but too often we confine them to one category or use.

I think that's very interesting.

(happy music)