Last December, Pantone crowned “Cloud Dancer,” a billowy shade of white, as the Color of the Year for 2026. Just a few months later, there is proof to recommend that the go-to hue specialists could have staged their newest coronation a shade prematurely.
From espresso outlets in New York to bakeries in Sydney and wonder retailers in London, a purple reign is taking root throughout the globe. Ranging from vivid violet to gentle lavender, the actual tone varies however it may be traced again to the Philippines.
More particularly, to simply beneath the archipelago’s floor to a native species of yam. It’s a starchy root vegetable with many names — dioscorea alata, uwhi, Guyana arrowroot — however is most frequently recognized regionally, and more and more internationally, as ube.
Meaning “tuber” in Tagalog, a language spoken throughout the Philippines, ube (pronounced oo-beh) is changing into an more and more profitable Filipino export as the remainder of the world seeks to sate its urge for food for the earthy purple ingredient with a nutty or vanilla-like style.
Almost 1.7 million kilograms of ube merchandise, price over $3.2 million, had been exported by the Southeast Asian nation final 12 months, in line with information shared with NCS by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) of the Philippines, a 20.4% rise from 2024.
Nearly half of these ube exports, roughly 956,000 kg price $1.5 million, went to the United States. That’s double the quantity the US imported the earlier 12 months, surpassing the 5 subsequent greatest markets — Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and New Zealand — mixed.
Look no additional than Starbucks, which rolled out an iced ube coconut macchiato throughout its US shops earlier this month as a “trending” addition to its refreshed spring menu.
Citing its recognition final 12 months amongst prospects at the espresso chain’s Reserve shops — flagship places with distinctive drink choices — Starbucks has added much more ube merchandise in Europe, centering it in each iced and conventional vanilla lattes.
Some variations are infused with matcha, the Japanese inexperienced powdered tea that took the world by storm throughout the final decade, starring in virtually 700,000 TikToks (aka MatchaTok) by final September.
Sure sufficient, movies of customers sampling newly launched ube drinks — which have additionally been launched this month by UK-based coffee-shop chain Costa— are already rippling throughout the social media platform.
The parallels in two notably picturesque merchandise changing into viral hits will not be a coincidence to Bettina Makalintal, a senior reporter at meals and eating tradition web site Eater.
“It’s that immediate visual impact,” Makalintal, who was born in the Philippines earlier than transferring to the US at 5 years outdated, advised NCS.
“Even if there’s one thing that’s very acquainted and easy, if the colour is completely different or thrilling — like the rainbow bagel, like the acai bowl, like strawberries which are paler than a common strawberry, like matcha — it helps convey that enchantment.
“Ube felt like an obvious candidate based on both, ‘Here’s a new flavor that’s not very challenging to people, but also fits into this desire to have aesthetically pleasing food.’”
Drinks are just one department of the ube provide chain. When it is mashed and boiled with milk, sugar and butter, a thick unfold known as ube halaya — often known as halayang ube — is shaped.
While a standalone dessert, the jam is additionally used as a topping, filling or base in a vary of desserts. Kora, a Filipino pop-up bakery in New York City, amassed a 10,000-person ready record in 2021 due in half to the overwhelming recognition of its ube brioche doughnut. A everlasting store opened in Queens final March.
Cheesecake, flan and ice cream likewise boast ube-inspired variations throughout the globe, whereas Trader Joe’s ube mochi pancake and waffle combine has confirmed to be a smash stumble on its limited-time launch every year since 2020.
Even the magnificence world is capitalizing on the development, with cosmetics model Huda Beauty launching a assortment of ube-inspired merchandise, together with setting powder and lip gloss, globally in January 2025.
“Today it [ube] is everywhere,” UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) consultant in the Philippines Lionel Dabbadie stated in a speech at the International Farm Tourism Conference in the Filipino metropolis of Baguio earlier this month.
“Ube ice cream in New York, ube cakes in London, ube lattes in Tokyo. It is an incredible success story.”
Yet that success is placing big strain on these tasked with guaranteeing provide can preserve tempo with the world’s accelerating demand for the purple yam.
Annual ube manufacturing in the Philippines has dropped from above 15 million kilograms in 2021 to roughly 14 million kilograms throughout the final two years, according to the New York Times, with the majority of that produce being put aside for nationwide consumption. In latest years, Vietnam and China have accelerated their manufacturing of purple yams, the New York Times added.
Unlike rice, corn and different mass-produced crops, ube is usually grown on small, seasonal patches of farmland. With many plots unfold throughout the Central Visayas area, the tuber requires ample moisture all through its rising interval earlier than being harvested roughly 10 to 11 months after planting, between November and February.
That makes it notably weak to adjustments in circumstances — not superb in a nation that is changing into more and more accustomed to excessive climate.
Last November, Typhoon Fung-wong was the twenty first named storm in a 12 months to influence the Philippines, as the local weather disaster continues to disproportionately affect the Global South.
Additionally, many farmers are searching for to money in on the present international curiosity in ube by promoting as a lot of their harvest as doable whereas costs are larger, a February report by British multinational analysis agency BMI discovered. With ube usually grown by burying cut-up items of the tuber, the subsequent scarcity of fabric for the following harvest is solely deepening provide points, the report argued.
All these components contribute to the growing problem for Makalintal and wider Filipino American communities, like these in the “Little Manila” enclave of Woodside, Queens, to supply genuine ube.
“Many people that I’ve talked to, most of the Filipinos I know, can’t really get the real root vegetable,” Makalintal, who lives in New York City, stated.
“Demand has grown, but the availability and import market hasn’t necessarily kept up.”
Beyond logistics, there is a creeping concern raised by ube’s international uptake: that a beloved nationwide staple is changing into indifferent from its cultural roots.
Generations of Filipinos have toasted sizzling summer time days and celebratory events with a tall glass of halo-halo, an iconic shaved ice dessert the place ube halaya headlines a hodgepodge of colourful toppings, from candied jackfruits and sweetened beans to tapioca pearls.
The yam usually serves as the centerpiece of different nationwide dishes, equivalent to “champorado,” a candy rice porridge, and “mamón,” a sponge cake, however some concern its significance is being diluted upon arrival on international shores.
“I couldn’t believe it when I read that very few people know that ube comes from the Philippines,” Dabbadie continued in his convention speech.
For Makalintal, that contributes to a “troubling” self-fulfilling prophecy, whereby a lack of cultural understanding and provide points usually result in distributors substituting true ube for extract merchandise, candy potatoes, and even omitting it completely and relying solely on purple coloring to “take advantage” of the development.
It’s a difficulty exacerbated by ube’s inherently understated taste. When diminished to an extract, or combined with dominating flavors like coconut, many individuals attempting the litany of merchandise marketed as ube-flavored are sampling solely a hint, or nothing in any respect, of an ingredient that Makalintal and numerous others really feel passionately protecting of.
“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,” she stated.
“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.”