“A good pandan chiffon cake is moist and fluffy on the inside and a nice golden brown colour on the outside,” says chef Malcolm Lee of one-MICHELIN-star Peranakan restaurant Candlenut.
In that one sentence, he has encapsulated the sheer pleasure of tearing into this soft-as-clouds cake, one which CNN recently voted as Singapore (and Malaysia’s) national cake.
Many of us have asked friends to lug it back home from their travels, but here's the thing: the cake is in fact easy enough for the home baker. All it needs is fresh pandan leaves – not the easiest of Southeast Asian herbs to find, but it can be purchased from Thai or Indonesian specialty shops.
Chef Malcolm Lee. Photography by Wong Weiliang.
When whipping up a batch, the tricky part to creating a light-as-air cake is to aerate the batter properly. “Beat the egg whites well until they are firm,” says the chef. “When you fold the mixture together, make sure you don’t beat the air out of it.”
Another vital tip: always squeeze your own pandan juice. While factory-manufactured essence and colouring might be one less step to worry about, having fresh pandan gives a truly fragrant cake that no bottled essence can.
One final word of advise the chef has, is to use an oven thermometer. This is the important element that keeps the cake moist while sporting a brown crumb. “Every oven is different,” says Lee. “Even though the recipe says 160 degrees, you have to test your oven to see what works – it could be 170 degrees, or even 180 degrees.”
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Another vital tip: always squeeze your own pandan juice. While factory-manufactured essence and colouring might be one less step to worry about, having fresh pandan gives a truly fragrant cake that no bottled essence can.
One final word of advise the chef has, is to use an oven thermometer. This is the important element that keeps the cake moist while sporting a brown crumb. “Every oven is different,” says Lee. “Even though the recipe says 160 degrees, you have to test your oven to see what works – it could be 170 degrees, or even 180 degrees.”
The ingredients to make pandan chiffon cake. Photography by Wong Weiliang.
Ingredients
1) 6 egg yolks
2) 55g cake flour
3) 70g coconut milk
4) Freshly cut pandan leaves
5) 40g butter (melted)
6) 6 egg whites
7) 180g sugar
1) 6 egg yolks
2) 55g cake flour
3) 70g coconut milk
4) Freshly cut pandan leaves
5) 40g butter (melted)
6) 6 egg whites
7) 180g sugar
The completed pandan chiffon cake. Photography by Wong Weiliang.
Method
1) Preheat oven at 160 deg Celsius and prepare a 23cm chiffon cake tin.
2) Sift cake flour into a bowl and mix with egg yolk.
3) Prepare the pandan juice: wash 8 pandan leaves and cut into strips of 1 to 2 cm.
Blend with 50ml of plain water and strain the mixture to get 30ml of juice.
4) Mix coconut milk, pandan juice, melted butter and egg yolk mixture well.
5) Whisk egg white and sugar with mixer until soft peaks form.
6) Gently fold into egg yolk mixture and mix well.
7) Pour batter into cake tin and bake at 160 deg Celsius for 15 mins then reduce to 120 deg Celsius for 25mins.
8) Remove the cake from oven and turn cake tin upside down, leave to cool on a wire rack.
9) Run a thin blade knife around the sides of the pan and centre core to release the cake, run knife along the base of the pan to remove cake.
10) Cut into desired number of slices and serve.
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1) Preheat oven at 160 deg Celsius and prepare a 23cm chiffon cake tin.
2) Sift cake flour into a bowl and mix with egg yolk.
3) Prepare the pandan juice: wash 8 pandan leaves and cut into strips of 1 to 2 cm.
Blend with 50ml of plain water and strain the mixture to get 30ml of juice.
4) Mix coconut milk, pandan juice, melted butter and egg yolk mixture well.
5) Whisk egg white and sugar with mixer until soft peaks form.
6) Gently fold into egg yolk mixture and mix well.
7) Pour batter into cake tin and bake at 160 deg Celsius for 15 mins then reduce to 120 deg Celsius for 25mins.
8) Remove the cake from oven and turn cake tin upside down, leave to cool on a wire rack.
9) Run a thin blade knife around the sides of the pan and centre core to release the cake, run knife along the base of the pan to remove cake.
10) Cut into desired number of slices and serve.
Recommended reading: View all recipes here
