I missed two friends’ birthdays and thought I’ll bake a simple cake for them since we were having a Lunar New Year gathering. They wouldn’t like cakes that are overly sweet or decorated, so I chose to bake a simple pandan cake. The cake cracked though, I guess I need to do a few more bakes to study my oven and get that right temperature to achieve smooth tops for my sponge cakes. The bottom layer did not crack though, so I think it could be the higher temperature on the upper layer, getting there…. soon… The cake was fluffy and soft nonetheless. Here’s Jeannie Tay’s recipe.

 

 

 

 

(Makes a 8 inch cake)

Ingredients

  • 100g top flour
  • 100g milk (I skipped the coconut milk, you can mix 50g milk with 50g coconut milk or 100g coconut milk)
  • 100g caster sugar
  • 70g canola oil
  • 6 eggs, separated
  • 1 tsp pandan paste
  • 1 tsp cream of tartar (optional)
  • a pinch of salt

Method

  1. Preheat the oven at 170 degrees and line the bottom of the baking tin with baking paper.
  2. Sift the flour and salt together and set aside.
  3. In a small pot, heat the oil to about 70 degrees or until you see streaks in the oil.
  4. Pour in the sifted flour and whisk to combine.
  5. Add the milk and pandan paste and combine.
  6. Add the yolks and whisk till combined.
  7. In a clean mixing bowl, whisk egg whites till foamy and add the cream of tar tar (this is optional, it works to stabilise the egg whites) and whisk till soft peak.
  8. Add the sugar a spoonful at a time and beat till firm peak.
  9. Add a third of the meringue into the batter and use a hand whisk to combine the egg whites and the batter. You do not need to be too gentle a this time because this step is just to make the batter to be at a similar consistency with the meringue for easier combining.
  10. Fold in the rest of the meringue gently till the egg whites is no longer visible. Do not over mix. Pour the batter into prepared baking tin.
  11. Bake in the preheated oven for 15 minutes and lower the oven temperature to 145 degrees and bake for another 45 minutes.
  12. Leave to cool for a few minutes before unmoulding.

I really like that this is not as fragile as chiffon and not as dense as a pound cake, but still is soft and fluffy. A keeper, other than me having to achieve that smooth top.