Pandan Chiffon Cake Recipe

I haven't been actively using my chiffon cake tin so it's time to make another chiffon cake - an Asian/Singaporean classic Pandan Chiffon Cake! I'm going in cut short my rambling here and go straight into the recipe.

(For 17cm chiffon pan)

Ingredients
3 egg yolks
30g white castor sugar
50g oil
60g coconut milk
1 tsp homemade vanilla extract
Pandan extract (I used natural pandan flavouring by blending 100g pandan leaves with 150ml water. Sieve the blended mixture and squeeze leaves dry to get out all the remaining juices)
90g cake flour
1 tsp baking powder

3 egg whites
60g white castor sugar
0.25 tsp cream of tartar

Method
(*for step by step pictures, refer to previous post on Coffee Chiffon Cake)

1. Beat egg yolks till pale for 2 minutes on speed 2. Add in sugar and beat for another 3-4 minutes till fluffy.

2. Add in oil, milk, vanilla extract, pandan flavouring and mix well. Sieve in cake flour and baking powder. Mix well and leave aside.

Pale green from natural pandan juices

3. Whisk egg whites till frothy and and add in cream of tartar. Continue beating and add in sugar slowly. Beat till stiff peaks, or meringue stage.

4. Add beaten egg whites in 3 batches into egg yolk mixture. When mixing, be careful not to deflate the mixture as the air pockets are needed for the cake to rise.

5. Pour batter into pan and bake in pre-heated oven at 170 degrees for 55mins - 1hour. When ready, invert the mould and leave to cool for 1h before unmoulding.

Tips
It is extremely difficult to get pandan juice out of pandan leaves. Blending them takes a lot of time and patience but the results are well-worth it. The cake is super fragrant and all-natural and the pandan extract gives the cake a nice green hue. Choose pandan leaves that are more tender and light in colour for most juice. You can get a small bunch like the one I had below from major supermarkets for less than 50 cents!

Blend the leaves in batches. This is the blender I used as that's the only one I have at home. I would think a food processor would be easier.

Pandan extract!! A very lovely hue of green - all natural. If you cannot find fresh pandan leaves, you can use pandan essence or pandan paste as replacement. For a stronger pandan flavour, you can supplement your cake with pandan essence or pandan paste. Personally, I feel that using pandan leaves is more than sufficient - it already gives the cake a strong fragrance, flavour and colour!

Once you get past the most challenging phase of this cake project - the dreadful pandan juice extraction, you are rewarded with a delicious cake. You will never buy commercial again - trust me, I made this cake twice in just a week and this is coming from someone who hardly repeats her bakes :)

Oh so cottony soft!

I like to store my cakes in an air-tight container at room temperature. Please note that pandan cakes should be finished within 3 days of baking as coconut milk is used and will spoil when left out for too long. But they will probably be gone in less than 3 days :p