Recipe
🍳 BREAKFAST
Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream)
Roasted breadfruit pounded to a smooth, heavy paste and served with a well of hot coconut cream poured into the middle.
Ni-Vanuatu · easy · serves 4
prep 20 min · cook 45 min
~531 cal · 5g protein · 68g carbs · 31g fat · 13g fiber · 29g sugars · 27g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Nalot is the best-known dish across Vanuatu, a smooth heavy paste that once belonged to chiefs and ceremonies and is now cooked on feast days and eaten in the morning wherever trees grow.
Whole is roasted over the fire until the skin blackens, then peeled, cored and pounded with a wooden pestle until it turns dense and elastic, somewhere between mashed potato and warm dough.
It is shaped into a mound, a well is pressed into the middle, and hot is poured in to be scooped up with each piece. On Efate and the Shepherd Islands it is pounded communally and shared, and its faint smoky sweetness tastes of home.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian, vegan and gluten-, dairy-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 4
1 large (about 2 lbs) mature firm
Hard to find? green plantains or peeled taro - both pound to a similar dense paste, though neither carries the faint chestnut smokiness of roasted breadfruit
1.5 cups thick
1/2 tsp sea salt
as needed water
Instructions
1
Roast the whole breadfruit directly over an open flame or hot coals, turning often, until the skin is blackened all over and the flesh gives when pressed, about 40 minutes.
2
Let it cool enough to handle, then peel away the charred skin and cut out the fibrous central core.
3
Pound the hot flesh in a large bowl or on a board with a wooden pestle, adding a splash of water as you go, until it becomes smooth, sticky and elastic.
✎ Chef’s note
Pound it while it is still piping hot; cold breadfruit turns stiff and will not come together into a paste.
4
Gently warm the coconut cream with the salt in a small pan, without letting it boil.
5
Shape the pounded breadfruit into a mound, press a deep well into the middle, pour in the hot coconut cream, and serve at once, scooping the paste through the cream.
Efate and Shepherd Islands breadfruit tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Efate (Port Vila). Efate holds Port Vila, where lap lap bakes for hours under hot stones: grated root vegetable spread on leaves, soaked in coconut cream, and wrapped tight. Vanuatu's kitchen runs on taro, yam, breadfruit, coconut, and reef fish.
🗺️
Vanuatu. Kava is not a novelty here but a nightly institution, drunk at dusk in low-lit nakamals where conversation drops to a murmur out of respect for the drink. Pentecost and Tanna are the two islands where the greatest number of cultivars were developed, and the traditions at the northern and southern ends of the archipelago are distinct enough that researchers treat them separately.
🌍
Oceania. The staple crops here were carried on purpose. Lapita voyagers moving east from roughly three thousand years ago brought taro, yam, banana, breadfruit and coconut with them along with pigs and chickens, because most of the islands they settled had almost nothing edible growing on them. The earth oven travelled too, as umu, imu, hangi, lovo, mumu, motu and um.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Vanuatu
Lap LapGrated root vegetables and coconut cream wrapped in banana leaf and baked in an earth oven, Vanuatu's national dish.
TulukGrated cassava wrapped around heavily seasoned pork, bound in leaves and baked, sold by the piece at markets and kava bars.
SimboroGrated cassava rolled in island-cabbage leaves and simmered in coconut cream, Vanuatu's everyday take on laplap.
Browse all Vanuatu recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Oven, Mortar and pestle.
Storing it: Best straight off the heat. Leftovers keep 2 to 3 days refrigerated and reheat well in a hot oven rather than the microwave.
Make it a Vanuatu meal
Nakamal KavaDrink
Sweet Banana LaplapDessert
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Frequently asked questions
What is Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream)?
Roasted breadfruit pounded to a smooth, heavy paste and served with a well of hot coconut cream poured into the middle.
Where does Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) come from?
Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) is a Ni-Vanuatu dish from Efate (Port Vila), Vanuatu.
Can Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Nalot (Pounded Breadfruit with Coconut Cream) take to make?
About 65 minutes total (20 minutes prep, 45 minutes cooking), serving 4.
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