A few years ago, I asked whether Ube is becoming ubiquitous. The answer today is in some ways yes, yet in other ways no, with Ube’s popularity causing shortages in some Filipino American neighborhoods. A definite downside of mainstream representation.
How did it reach this point? Ube flavor is being incorporated into more and more products. Starbucks sells a iced ube coconut macchiato. UK based coffee chain Costa is also selling a sweet Ube hot chocolate and an Ube Frappe. This demand strains ube suppliers worldwide. Philippine production has actually dropped, while China and Vietnam are increasing shipments. Climate change is said to contribute to the problem. There are reports that people are substituting purple sweet potatoes or even using purple coloring to cash in on the hot ube trend.
While I mentioned representation, some reports say that many people have no idea that ube is from the Philippines. I could not find evidence for this either way. Still, many, probably most places that that sell ube flavored products don’t mention the Philippines or Filipino cuisine at all. Says Eater food writer Bettina Makalintal:
Everyone’s drinking ube now, but they don’t even really know the flavor. They’ve reduced it to this thing that’s just purple. The thing that’s hard is that it feels like one of those things where it feels like the byproduct of your culture … hitting the mainstream, where you just lose control of it in the cultural conversation. That is the trade-off of visibility.
(photo credit: Remi Tournebize licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.)
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