Pandan chiffon cake (water roux/ 汤面)

Still feeling unsettled for not trying out Happy Flour's recipe, I baked another pandan chiffon cake yesterday ..haha... 2 pandan chiffon cakes, 2 different recipes, in 2 days. Anyway, it feels like a proper closure.

The recipe is pretty easy to handle but my batter was quite watery and not as 'gluey' as Happy Flour's. In terms of pandan flavour, it's not prominent enough, so I would probably add a few drops of pandan paste the next time. Texture wise is fluffy & spongy except for some spots which I didn't do a good job in mixing the batter evenly. Also I did not manage to achieve the nice brown skin like Happy Flour... will continue to try! Regardless, it still a good recipe.



Pandan chiffon cake (water roux/ 汤面)
(Recipe adapted from Happy Flour)

Ingredients/ Method:
Batter:
5 egg yolk
70g coconut milk (I diluted with 50% water as I don't like the strong taste of coconut milk)
30g pandan juice (see below for making pandan juice)
50g unsalted butter
1/4tsp salt (I reduced to 1/8 tsp)
90g cake flour (sifted)

Egg whites:
5 egg white
1/3 tsp cream of tartar
85g caster sugar

1. Preheat oven to 175C.
2. Mix egg yolks and pandan juice together, set aside.
3. Pour coconut milk, salt and butter in a sauce pan, boil over low fire till butter melted about 60-65C (when few bubbles started to appear on the surface).
4. Remove from fire, add in flour and stir till it form a soft dough.
5. Slowly add in egg yolks mixture, whisk till smooth batter and set aside.
6. Use a cake mixer, whisk egg whites and cream of tartar till frothy.
7. Gradually add in sugar and whisk till stiff peaks form.
8. Fold in 1/4 of the meringue into the egg yolk batter until combined. (By now, the egg yolk batter should be lukewarm.)
9. Then fold in the rest of the meringue in two portions until well combined.
10.Pour batter into a 23cm tube pan, smooth the surface.
11.Place pan into a preheated oven and bake for 40-45mins.
12.Remove from oven, invert cake onto table top and leave it cool.

To make pandan juice:
1. Blend 10-12 blades of pandan leaves with 100ml of water, squeeze out the liquid from the puree.
2. Pour the pandan juice into a bottle, cover and chill in the fridge overnight for the residue to settle down.
3. Discard the clear liquid, use the residue left at the bottom of the liquid. This concentrate part of pandan juice give cakes a nice and light fragrant of pandan leaf.