Pandan Coconut Sponge Cake (Pandan Powder)

A relatively healthier pandan coconut sponge cake from my previous recipe. I kept half the oil quantity  as coconut oil for aroma, and substituted the other half of the oil quantity by healthier rice bran oil 😃. The recipe also cut down the fine sugar quantity by 5g - though it was a small reduction 😉

To cut down on the trouble of having to prepare the fresh pandan juice/paste, I substituted it by pandan powder for colour, and a small young pandan leaf for flavour. Well, this substitution was enough to let me see and taste the pandan colour and flavour of the moist and velvety pandan sponge cake 💚💚💚😀

Cake Ingredients

All ingredients in room temperature
Using 52~55g Omega 6 eggs

20g organic coconut oil

18g rice bran oil/mild flavour vegetable oil

60g top/cake flour

1~2g pandan powder

30g low fat milk

10g honey

1g young fresh pandan leaf, chopped finely(add more for a stronger aroma)

3 egg yolks

3 egg whites
pinch of salt
20g fine sugar

20g raw sugar

Directions
1. Line an 6" round cake pan with parchment paper at the base. Need not grease the wall of the pan. Place a grid iron at the base of a 20cm square pan. Set aside.
I bought the grid iron from Daiso.

2. Combine low-fat milk, honey and chopped pandan leaf in a small glass. Set aside.

3. Warm coconut oil and rice bran oil till reaching about 75 to 80℃, remove from the heat source.

Pour in the top flour and pandan powder mixture, and mix with a spatula into a sticky paste.

4. Pour in the pandan-milk mixture from Step 2, and mix well.

5. Combine the yolks, one at a time, to the pandan batter till well combined. Set aside.

6.  Beat egg whites in a clean, dry and grease-free bowl, till frothy. Add in a pinch of salt, and first batch of the sugar mixture. Continue to beat the egg whites. Slowly add in the remaining sugar mixture in two batches. Stop beating after the meringue has achieved firm peak stage.

7. Transfer about 1/4 of the meringue to mix with the pandan batter from Step 5.

Pour the pandan batter back to mix with the remaining meringue.

8. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan from Step 1.

Stand the cake pan over a grid iron rest in a 20cm square pan, filled with 2cm deep of hot water,

The grid iron is optional.

9. Preheat the oven to 160℃ for about 10 minutes. Bake at lower rack of a preheated convection oven, lower the temperature to 140℃ after closing the oven door, and bake for 55 minutes. 

Please adjust the oven temperature setting according to your oven requirement for baking a sponge cake.

10. Remove the cake from the oven. If you want to dry the cake after un-moulding, you may want to keep the oven door close to conserve the heat.

Drop the cake with the pan from a height of about 10 cm onto a kitchen towel thrice.
Let the cake cool down for about 20 minutes in the pan, or till the cake shrinks away from the wall of the pan.

When the cake starts to pull away from the wall of the pan, jiggle to loosen the cake,

and turn it out to a cooling rack.

You may want to dry the cake in a warm oven using the remnant heat for about 15 minutes.

11. Cut the cake after cooling down. Enjoys 😋 

Spinach Quiche

My first spinach potato quiche recipe was posted more than 8 years ago. After these years of using raw spinach and pie crust, I have decided to make some changes to the steps. The pie crust was baked briefly, and the spinach was blanched and have the juice extracted out partially. And I got a crispier crust and more spinach this time 😍

The quiche was also baked with less oil by using low-fat milk, and have the onions baked to fragrant without any oil being added. However, for the pie crust, French butter was being used without any substitution to get a better crust flavour. Low-sodium salt was used for a healthier version 🧂 

The brown cheesy crust was the best flavoured part of the quiche. Satisfied 😋

Pie Crust

Ingredients

140g plain flour

20g superfine wholegrain flour/plain flour

90g cold unsalted butter

3g low-sodium salt

5g raw sugar

35g cold water, to be added gradually

Directions

1. Place all the ingredients in a mixing bowl before chilling in the fridge for about 15 minutes.

 

2. Mix all the ingredients in the mixing bowl except the cold water. Use a dough cutter to cut the butter into smaller crumbs till it resembles bread crumbs.

You can also use a food processor to do this step faster. But I prefer hand workout 😆

3. Gradually add cold water to the crumbs, and combine it into a soft dough. 

Avoid adding the cold water in one go!

When the crumbs become more lumpy

use hands to compress them into a single dough. Add cold water as necessary to bind all the loose crumbs into one.

4. Divide the dough into 4 portions, roll into balls, and keep in the fridge for 15 to 20 minutes.

5. Flatten the dough ball between 2 plastic sheets, into a thin dough just slightly bigger than the 5” pie pan

Shape the dough to sit in the pan.

Poke a series of holes at the base of the dough.

Bake at 180℃ for 10 minutes. Remove from oven.

 

Spinach Filling

Ingredients in room temperature  

60g onion, julienned 

112g  blanched spinach, squeeze dry partially 

7g chopped garlic 

Dash of black pepper powder

3 eggs (about 55g each)

75g low-fat milk

Some seasoning powder, eg Knorr Hao Chi

Directions

1. Seal julienned onion in a parchment paper pouch and bake at 150℃ for 15 minutes, or till softened. Set aside.

2. Blanch about 200g of spinach in boiling water added with salt and oil, till softened. Squeeze out excess liquid and cut into short lengths. Set aside.

3. Mix eggs, milk, seasoning powder together in a beaker.

Topping 
35g pizza cheese topping 

Assembling the quiche 

Get all ingredients ready 👇

1. Add softened onion and spinach to the 4 baked pie crust. 

2. Sprinkle chopped garlic, black pepper powder over, then pour the egg mixture over till reaching almost the brim of the pie crust.

3. Sprinkle grated pizza cheese over the top.

4. Bake in a preheated oven at 200℃ for 12 minutes, reduce the temperature to 180℃ and bake for 2 minutes, turn off the oven and continue to bake for 5 minutes, or till the quiches are cooked through.

5. Serve hot 🥧😋