The Failed Mango Pudding Breakdown

The mango season this year started on early October and running until today when I write this post. Oh my. I love mango deeply. Got the sour mango? Let’s shredded and toast with sambal. Fresh sweet prefectly? Just eat raw. Mango Sticky Rice? Yasss! Mango pickle? Suuuuuuureeeeeee. Mango never fails me until ummm this pudding recipe. Let me explain what happened.

Mango Pudding

The peak mango season was in November in my town. The prices are getting cheaper and cheaper as cheap as 1 to get 3kilos. Crazy isn’t?!!?? As a cult of mango, this year would be waste if I don’t tried anything new for my mango exploration.

I started to googled mango recipe. It turns out million recipes.
Sticky rice? Done that before.
Mango sambal? Overrated.
Mango pickles (sweet/hot)? Been there.
Mango slushy? Oh dear, tell me something new.
Mango salad? Hmmm are you new?
Mango pudding? Wait, what? I never did that before! Sounds nice to beat this hot long summer.

Mango Pudding Element

So, my vision is clear now, Mango Pudding is my goal. I was searching mango pudding and got thousands options, plenty fish in the sea they said. Various method and style available but which one is the right ones?

After read almost fifty recipes from around the globe, I can say they have same ingredients

  • Mango Puree
    Obviously, to get the real mango pudding you need mango puree, not mango juice. Mango puree is mango that you can get from the real fresh cut mango and soften with stick blender and sifted to remove the ‘fiber’. For some various mango, when it is really ripe you can directly soften it with your spoon and sifter. The other hand, mango juice is liquid that you can make with fresh cut mango and some liquid (can be water/milk) to make it easier the belnder do the work. Best mango puree to make pudding would be mango that have distinct aroma. Which aroma is best? It depends on your preference. My favourite is mango Gadung or Indramayu because thick, juicy, sweet, and have its own aroma when it totally ripe.
  • Milk
    They said milk or coconut milk for vegan recipes. Most of the recipe that use milk are Indonesian or vegan/vegetarian blog source. Also it is cheaper and easier to get in Indonesia. The milk would be make the pudding taste creamier and richer. All the milk from supermarket have a less than 10% of fat.
  • Heavy Cream
    The other hand, most of western recipes would like to add heavy creamy to get creamier taste and richer than milk since it contains at least 36% of fat. Since it has more fat, it will make the pudding more stiff than regular milk. Unfortunately, it harder to find in my place and the price is almost 10x times.
  • Agar-agar/Gelatine
    It is setting agent. There is no pudding in the world that no use setting agent, the pudding wouldn’t be set. Agar-agar made from seaweed that founded in Japan centuries ago and became common in some South East Asia, including indonesia. It is also gelatine substitute for vegetarian/vegan recipes. It can get easily in warung or toko in here.
    The gelatine is colourless, odorless, and tasteless setting agent. It made from boiled bones, skins. and tendon of animals, mostly from cow or pig. It comes from powder or leaf. Most of regular warung or toko don’t have it in here and you need to go the bakery supplies. The powdered gelatine easily to use for beginner. The leaf gelatine is preffered for professional since it is clearer than powdered.
  • Sugar
    All the recipes still need sugar to kick the sweetness because from mango itself is not enough. I think because it will be added other liquid like milk/heavy cream also when you serve something cold, the sweetness felt slightly decreased. For example, think about the ice cream that felt sweeter when melted 😉

Why I Chose This Recipe

Once my friend posted it online and the picture is too tempting to try. I have mango, sugar, milk, and agar-agar in my kitchen. Everything already there. So, why not?

I would not to write the recipe here nor in youtube since I do not recommended it. But I made the process video to make the pudding to asking some people what goes wrong in this recipe.

Let me know if you spot something wrong in my cooking process

My Thoughts

Firstly, This recipe claimed that it has soft texture and creamy since it only use milk as liquid. It did as the result if it compared with regular agar-agar that use only regular water as liquid. It is not as jelly as I thought. The result is still stiff and set hard.

Secondly, where is my puree going? Unfortunately, the mango aroma and taste itself totally off. It sad since I expected the mango pudding with the real mango taste. I think the mangoes off since it cooked with the milk. As the main liquid who played big role, the milk aroma made a big impact as well. Frankly, it we (my friend taht come over as tester) agreed it tasted more like my pumpkin dessert instead mango pudding.

The pack of agar-agar is 7gr with the recommended liquid to dilute is 900ml. That I didn’t realise before I tried is total liquid in this recipe is 600ml of milk and approximately mango puree between 250-300ml. In total would be 900ml. It will set hard like regular pudding as recommended.


To sum up, make a pudding with milk as full liquid is not a good idea since it will bring distinct aroma, it is creamy but if you are sensitive with aroma, you need to think about it. The amount liquid that you need to dilute agar-agar/gelatine is important. Anyway, everything is on your preference. The most important thing is: How to ‘still’ get mango taste when it’s cooked? Still mystery.