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Thursday, September 02, 2025
Refresh!
You know what’s really good for hot, hot days when your body just seems completely zapped of all energy? When every fiber of your being seems infused with lethargy?
On days like those, what I enjoy is lots and lots of barley water. Yep. Barley water. Just barley cooked in lots of water, with a small bunch of knotted pandan (screwpine) leaves thrown in for added fragrance. It can either be sweetened with a piece of rock sugar dissolved into the mixture right at the end of the cooking, or with a side serving of a simple syrup made up of rock sugar and water – this allows everyone to sweeten the drink to their personal liking. I like mine thirst quenchingly unsweetened.
Another thing I enjoy about drinking barley water: right at the end, after the drink is gone… I find an almost child-like delight in using a spoon to dig up all that cooked-down, soft, very tender, somewhat fluffy yet slightly chewy barley sitting at the bottom of the glass. What simple pleasure!
Barley water, served hot or cold, is wondrously light, refreshing and cleansing; and one of the traditional favorite hot weather drinks of South East Asia.
Barley is said to have many health-giving properties; Traditional Chinese Medicine believes it to have great cooling properties for “heaty” bodies, to be a very efficacious detoxifier and cleanser of the intestinal tract, and to be a soothing balm on overworked and stressed digestive systems. Barley is also a natural diuretic.
But all that health and medical mambo-jumbo aside, nothing is quite as delicious - or reviving - as a tall glass of icy cold barley water on a muggy, stiflingly hot and dry summer’s afternoon.
Salut!
Copyright © 2004 Renee Kho. All Rights Reserved.
Please contact me for permission to copy, publish, distribute or display any of the images or text contained in this article.
05:36 PM in Home Cook: Light Touches | Permalink
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We have barley water every week.The humans will have the liqud while our koi will have the cooked barley. I like my barley water sweetened with candied winter melon and a squeeze of lemon.
Posted by: ST | September 2, 2025 11:22 PM
Yes!! Barley water. I often read about this drink in novels taking place in South East Asia. But,I could never really picture what it looks like. I like the idea of eating the barley at the bottom of the glass.
Sher
Posted by: sher | September 3, 2025 12:31 AM
Oh, my favourite is to nibble on the chewy barley kernels after drinking the liquid. I like to add ice cubes to thin the thickened liquid down. Now, I just may have to whip up a batch this afternoon. :-)
Thanks for the lovely photos of your culinary adventures!
Posted by: lannie | September 3, 2025 01:31 AM
hi ST,
nice to hear from you!
I like the idea of a squeeze of lemon in the barley water... I think the additional tang must be lovely... will try that the next time. thanks : )
and btw, I think your kois are very lucky fishes indeed!
but I think I like my chewy barley pearls too much to want to share mine with my kois ; D
hi Sher,
the drink itself is actually fairly viscous... and personally, the chewy barley pearls are the most fun part of the experience : )
hi lannie,
lovely to hear from you : )
and you're most welcome... I'm glad you're enjoying the posts and the pics.
isn't barley water quite wonderful? so simple, yet so refreshingly good! : )
Posted by: Renee | September 3, 2025 02:33 AM
hmm...mebbe i will go to the chinese grocery store to look for some barley
Posted by: toru | September 3, 2025 04:14 AM
kinda looks like korean rice punch! those are good.. do they sell them over there? you should try some :)
Posted by: jinny | September 3, 2025 06:12 AM
my variation of barley drink - add crushed candied winter melon. this actually sweeten the drink and it give the drink a nice fragrant.
Posted by: babe_kl | September 3, 2025 09:53 AM
Didn't know there are so many variations to the humble barley drink. Used to add lemon juice for lemon barley flavour but the family hates it. The cooked barley pearls also adds to your fibre intake and really helps with the bowels. Used to give my children when they are constipated. Till now, they like the occasional cooked pearls.
Posted by: nyetzy | September 3, 2025 02:25 PM
you remind me to make some. it's so simple, so good and scrummy :) i love the idea of adding some lemon to it - the good ol' lemon barley drink.
Posted by: stef | September 4, 2025 12:09 AM
You know, I've never considered actually making barley water! We always used to buy the gloopy concentrates (in loads of different flavours) when I was a kid. Do you know if this is just regular barley or is there a Chinese variant that you've used? (It looks like normal barley, but you never know :) )
Posted by: Angela | September 4, 2025 02:27 AM
hey reneee - I made a drink myself...check it out
http://mybuddies.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1248&get;=last#7685
Posted by: toru | September 4, 2025 02:45 AM
hiya it's me again...did i tell u your blog is being traded on blogshares. See
http://www.blogshares.com/blogs.php?blog=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.shiokadelicious.com%2Fshiokadelicious%2F
Posted by: toru | September 4, 2025 02:55 AM
hi renee. my visits back to singapore are punctuated by actively searching the hawker centres for drinks aunties who sell barley peng. :) yesterday, inspired by you, i went to a health food barn and bought a packet of barley. the girl at the cashier said "everyone's buying barley today!" must be something in the air. i'll be boiling it up in a bit.
Posted by: bowb | September 5, 2025 06:28 AM
hi jinny,
thanks for stopping by : )
I've never seen nor tasted rice punch... now I'm really curious.
what is it exactly? and how does it taste? can I make it at home?
hi babe kl,
interesting suggestion : )
I'll have to try that sometime when I feel like having sweetened barley water (I tend to almost always drink it unsweetened).
I think the only time I really use candied winter melon is for sweetening liang cha (herbal cooling "tea")... I boil the dried leaves with candied winter melon... yum! I love liang cha!
hey nyetzy,
I've never tried lemon juice with barley (thus far I've been pretty much a purist ; ))... would lime be better? or too sour?
heh. yeah. the additional side benefit of smoother flow in "housekeeping" is good bonus ; D
hi stef,
long time no hear : )
agree totally... so simple, and so scrummy!
hi angela,
oh, you have to try making some fresh ones... so totally different from the concentrates.
fresh-made is so much lighter and less cloying and pungent.
this is just the regular pearl barley... tho' some people will say it's much better (healthwise) to use the barley that still have their husks on (this I've never tried tho')
toru,
: )
and yeah, I found out some time back that I was listed on blogshares... just never found the time (or made the effort) to go register myself and "claim my blog".
thanks anyway for letting me know : )
so, have you bought any shares in my blog? ; )
hey bowb,
so nice to hear from you again ; )
: D thanks for sharing that story... the barley mood must be sweeping through indeed! ; D
hope you enjoyed your barley water ; )
Posted by: Renee | September 5, 2025 02:51 PM
http://www.kgrocer.com/ProductImages/drink_can/DRINK-CAN-NONGHP-SIKHYE-239ml-2.gif
that's a picture of it.. they sell those cans in asian stores :)
my grandma used to make it at home, but it's really complicated.. this recipe makes it sound simple, but my grandma's traditional rice punch took way longer.. but anyways here ya go
Ingredients:
• 1 pound malt flour, coarse flakes
• 1 cup rice
• 1 cup sugar
Instructions:
Combine 1 gallon of water with the malt flour. Remove the particles of floating malt using a fine-mesh strainer, or by cupping it with your hand, and discard. Allow the malt to soak in the water until the water gets cloudy, 5 to 6 hours. Use a fine-mesh strainer to separate the malt flour from the water. Save the cloudy water to make the drink but discard the malt. Using a rice cooker, combine rice with 3/4 cup of water and cook. After 25 to 30 minutes, the rice should be cooked. Gently pour the malt water into the rice cooker with the cooked rice. If there are any more floating particles of malt, discard them. Stir 2 tablespoons of sugar into the malt water and rice in the rice cooker. Leave the comtents on "warm" for 5 hours in the rice cooker. By now the body of the rice grain should be dissolved and the rice bits should appear in flat pieces. Transfer the contents in the rice cooker to a pot and boil once with the rest of the sugar mixed in. Chill. Garnish with pine nuts before serving.
Posted by: jinny | September 5, 2025 03:18 PM
hi jinny,
wow, thanks so much for the recipe!
hmmm... you're right, it does sound rather involved... ; p
I think I might just pop down to one of the Korean grocery shops in town to see if I can find a ready-made version to try first : )
thanks so much for sharing : )
Posted by: Renee | September 7, 2025 03:29 AM
