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School work has really been piling up. With it being the third last week of school, the number of assignments, projects, presentations and all sorts of miscellaneous stuff is endless.

In the midst of all this stress, baking is probably my only comfort. My friends find it weird that instead of spending my time studying or chasing my work, I’m instead, baking away in the kitchen. I wouldn’t say that baking isn’t time consuming. But really, it doesn’t take up that much time (especially when you have help to clean up hehehe). It’s a great stress reliever and while I don’t really eat much of the stuff I make (gasp!), feeding other people makes me feel really happy.DSC_0153

I was in school having my marketing meeting when I decided that I’d go home and make pandan chiffon cake. This was the first time I’d ever made a chiffon cake. I always just eat it. I love love love pandan chiffon cake. It brings back happy memories of me as a kid (thank you Bengawan Solo).

Sadly, my very excited mom helped me take the chiffon cake out of the tin before the half hour mark was up (I’m not sure if that’s the reason, or that the base of my chiffon tin was also too stuck). Soooo, the cake kinda broke off somewhere at the side. I’ve only got photos of the slice of the chiffon cake but even though it broke, it still tastes pretty darn awesome!

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Next time, I’ll probably half the recipe and make a smaller chiffon cake. This one was rather ginormous, although it meant that many people got to benefit from it.

The recipe is adapted from Mrs Leong’s cookbook (yes, really old school I know). But it is without a doubt a beyond awesome pandan chiffon cake. It’s not as healthy as chiffon cakes should be, but really, the fluffiness, the richness of coconut and fragrance of pandan, that makes this cake so perfect and warming to the heart.

Pandan Chiffon Cake

Adapated from Mrs Leong’s cookbook

25-cm chiffon cake tin
Serves 12-16 people

Ingredients:

A:

  • 170ml coconut milk
  • 2 tbsp pandan juice
  • 1 tsp green colouring (I used 1/2 tsp but you can do without it unless you think people would imagine it tastes more pandan-ish with more green)

B:

  • 9 egg whites
  • 1 tsp cream of tartar

C:

  • 8 egg yolks
  • 255g sugar
  • 170ml corn oil / vegetable oil (this is what I used)

D: 

  • 140g cake flour
  • 2 heaped tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt

Directions:

– Preheat oven to 170 degrees C.

A:

  1. Heat coconut milk in a saucepan on low heat, stirring constantly until it thickens (and becomes more like cream)
  2. Squeeze pandan leaves to get pandan juice (I squeeze A LOT so I ended up getting 250ml which is unnecessary. Just about 12 leaves should be enough?)
  3. Leave coconut milk aside to cool

B:

  1. Whip egg whites in stand-mixer until frothy
  2. Sieve in cream of tartar
  3. Whip till egg whites are stiff, but not dry
  4. Set aside

C:

  1. Whisk yolks, sugar and oil until well combined

D:

  1. Sieve flour, baking powder and salt two times
  2. Set aside

All together:

  1. Create a well in the flour.
  2. Put C mixture into the centre and fold flour from sides until well combined
  3. Place in mixer and add in coconut milk, pandan juice and colouring till well combined. Do not overmix.
  4. Take 1/3 of the meringue and fold into the mixture. Do it gentlyDSC_0123-2
  5. Take remaining meringue and fold it in. Ensure that you do not deflate the meringue
  6. Put batter into ungreased chiffon tin
  7. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean, or your finger springs back
  8. EAT EAT EAT 🙂DSC_0172-2

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