Making Tapioca Pearls?

Question

Could someone could tell me how to make my own Tapioca Pearls? NOT how to cook Tapioca Pearls, but how to actually make the Pearls themselves.

Answer 1

http://www.ellenskitchen.com/faqs/tapioca1.html

Answer 2

Making Tapioca Pearls

Answer 3

Get fresh Casava (Tapioca ) tubers. Peel and wash. Cut into bits. Add enough water and grind into a fine pulp. Finer the better. Using a very fine cloth squeeze out the milk from the pulp. Throw away the fibre after completely squeezing out the milk. Allow the milk to settle in a wide shallow pan. After some time, may be overnight, you can see the starch settled at the bottom. Slowly pour out the water above the sediment. Take care not to disturb the settled starch. After removing the water completely remove the starch from the pan and crush it into fine powder. This would have about 35 % moisture. Take the fine powder in a wide smooth surfaced tray, hold with both hands and using circular motion like hoopla hoop vibrate the tray. You can see the starch becoming small pellets. Keep removing the balls formed now and then. These balls would disintegrate if you press between fingers and would dissolve in water when added as it is. So they have to be gelatinized by heat application. You can do this by frying the balls in a shallow pan. The pan should be flat and shallow. Brush some cooking oil on to the pan. Preferably coconut oil for the flavor. Transfer the soft pellets to the pan and fry for few minutes. You can see the pearls becoming translucent. Remove from fire and dry till it is hard.You may have to resort to sun drying. Oven drying would cook the pearls. This is very crude method. You can try and refine it by experience. Best of luck.