Thursday 28 February 2008

Going Green

For the past whole week, I have been thinking of nothing but baking something with my matcha or green tea powder. The choices are either a green tea with red beans loaf, or a green tea with red beans muffins...on certain days the thought of making a green tea Swiss roll seems just right. It was only this morning that I finally get down to make a green tea chiffon cake.

I didn't manage to get a 'proper' green tea chiffon cake recipe anywhere...neither from books nor the internet. Somehow, most of the recipes I could locate where not really meant for my small 16cm (6") chiffon pan. In the end, I had to fall back on the same recipe that I used to make my first chiffon cake.


As I was 'home alone' for a couple of hours this afternoon, I had some fun playing around with the chiffon cake after it was cooled off. I took numerous shots of the cake from all sort of angles...


this is one of my favourites among the lot. It is not a fantastic picture, but somehow I just like the way the image turned out.


Thanks to my very thin bladed knife, I was able to unmold the cake without too much damage done on the sides.


This closed-up reminds me of nothing...but, pork floss (^p^)



Just like my previous attempts, there were many holes and tunnels in the final product :( Not sure what went wrong, but it would likely be due to the folding of the egg whites to the yolk batter??


Instead of the usual green tea and red beans combo, I replaced the red beans with some dark chocolate chips.


Even though I used a tablespoon of green tea powder, the taste of green tea was not as prominent as I would expect. Nonetheless, I find the green tea and chocolate chips combination rather 'delightful'...a very interesting blend of flavours.

Matcha Chiffon Cake with Chocolate Chips

Ingredients(make one 16cm cake)
1 tablespoon green tea powder
30ml milk
2 egg yolks
20g caster sugar
20ml vegetable oil
40g self-raising flour

2 egg whites
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
50g caster sugar

some dark chocolate chips

Method:
  1. Sieve flour and green tea powder together, set aside.
  2. Separate egg yolks/whites and bring to room temperature.
  3. Whisk egg yolks and sugar in a mixing bowl until sugar just dissolved. Add in milk and oil. Whisk till combined. Sieve over the flour and green tea powder mixture and fold gently with a spatula until flour mixture is fully incorporated into the batter.
  4. In a clean, dry mixing bowl, whisk egg whites and cream of tartar with an electric mixer until mixture becomes frothy and foamy. Add in the sugar in 3 separate additions while beating at high speed till just before stiff peaks form*(after note: after several attempts at baking chiffon cakes, I learned that the whites should be beaten until just before stiff peaks form).
  5. Add the egg white foam into the egg yolk batter in 3 separate additions, each time folding gently with a spatula until just blended.
  6. Pour 1/3 of the batter into a 16cm (6 inch) tube pan (do not grease the pan). Sprinkle chocolate chips over the batter. Pour the remaining half of the batter. Sprinkle with chocolate chips. Pour the rest of the batter into the pan. Spread the batter evenly.
  7. Bake in pre-heated oven at 170 degC for 25 ~ 30mins or until the cake surface turns golden brown, and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
  8. Remove from the oven and invert the pan immediately. Let cool completely before unmould.

52 comments:

Anonymous said...

really beautiful chiffon cake! and could see you had a fun time taking the picture, the collage is definitely creatively taken. I love the middle when you see thru from the bottom of the pan to the cake! Great job!

Mandy said...

nice shots! I have yet baked a green tea chiffon cake, but it is certainly something I will do soon!! As for the bubbles,maybe you can try to tap the sides of the pan lightly before the cake goes into the oven. This trick always work for me. :)

Cookie baker Lynn said...

That sounds like an intriguing flavor combination.

My mother-in-law says to bang the cake on the counter before putting it in the oven to get rid of the big air bubbles. I've never been brave enough, fearing it would totally deflate the cake.

cocoa said...

Always enjoy you food photo.. good shot! and the cake looks yummy too

Baking Fiend said...

good looking cake! you have to bang hard on the couter to get rid of the big bubbles b4 putting the cake into the oven to bake.

Anonymous said...

Yes, the trick is to lightly bang the cake tin on the counter to get rid of the air bubbles. Also, fold in the egg white as lightly as possible with a spatula.

Happy Homebaker said...

Thanks Elyn, I like that picture too :D

Mandy, Lynn, Ida, Anonymous, thanks for the useful tips! I tried banging it, but probably I was too gentle with it as I was worried that the batter will deflate, as the pan was only 60% filled with the batter!

Aimei said...

Wow, really nice chiffon you always got! So beautiful. Great idea with green tea and chocolate. :)

sweet-tooth said...

Your chiffon cake looks beautiful(:
It's so tall and majestic!
Lol

KWF said...

How I envy your chiffon cake. I tried 3 times (the last time with my baking teacher) using my oven (which is also Teffal 20L). All ended up as failures. Seems like my oven cannot bake cakes that well, esp chiffon. So now I'm into baking bread...lol...

btw, you've been tagged. Check it out here.

Anonymous said...

Hi HHB, you have been tagged! this time for a MeMe survey. Here is the link - http://www.playkeen.blogspot.com/

Auvery Eva said...

saw your image on flickr and had to look at your recipe - the photos here are lovely...wonder if it would work wheat free...

Small Small Baker said...

Hi HHB, your green tea chiffon looks really beautiful! I like how all your photos are taken. I did a green tea chiffon cake before too, using a different recipe. Mine also had some holes and tunnels although I had already bang many times on my table. ;)

Hope to see more green tea recipes from u. :)

Happy Mrs Kwok said...

Hi HHB,

Your matcha chiffon cake looks so awesome! I've never tried baking with Matcha before. Is that difficult?

Anonymous said...

Hi HBB

I love your matcha chiffon, look so nice, i guess taste nice too. baking chiffon cake is something i dread, mayb due to failure of doing it in the past. but will try again as i hv bought green tea powder recently.

hey, i hv tagged u also. i noe u hv been tagged by many pple. ^o^

here is it ......
http://esther247.blogspot.com

best regards
esther

Anonymous said...

Hi HHB

Just now forgot to ask you, if i hv a 21cm chiffon pan, what changes do i need to make to the amt of ingredients used? really want to try your recipe, look so so good!

thanks in advance.

rgds
esther

Happy Homebaker said...

Aimei, nah, I am no good at chiffon cake at all...I still need to try to get rid of the holes and tunnels ;p

Sweet-tooth, don't let the photo fool you! The cake is only about 6-7cm tall...as the cake pan is very small, only 16cm.

KWF, chiffon is real tricky isn't it? Have you found out why your chiffon cake failed? Was it due to the oven temperature? Thanks for tagging me...wow it's a long meme, will see whether I will be able to get to it ;)

Emily, thanks for the tagging me too!

Hi Auvery Eva, thanks for visiting :)

Small small baker, it was after having seen your green tea chiffon, that I have been wanting to try it. but I checked the original recipe by Florence, and noticed that it is meant for a bigger pan...since I have no confidence with chiffon cake, i didnt dare to try halve the recipe. I do suspect it's the way I fold in the egg white that's creating all the holes and tunnels!

Hi Mrs Kwok, I guess using matcha powder doesn't really make it anymore difficult...although I still think, making chiffon cake is real tricky, espeically with the beating and folding of the egg white. I need more practise!

Hi Esther, thanks for tagging me too :D
I won't advise you to adjust the amount of ingredients to fit your cake pan...as personally I think, chiffon cake is not as forgiving as other cakes where u can reduce or increase the amount accordingly. I will suggest that you look for a basic chiffon recipe that suits your cake pan, then add in the green tea powder. Since your's is a 21cm pan, you may like to take a look at the green tea recipe by Florence over here: http://wlteef.blogspot.com/2005/08/green-tea-chiffon-cake.html, hope this helps :)

cocoraisin said...

Hello HHB,

I really love your blog here. I am learning to bake bread and trying to take pictures of my breads.

How do you create such beautiful pictures? What do you use for lighting and background? My pictures always turn out to be dull in color.

Thank you so much HHB :)

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Coco, thanks for your kind comments! I take my photos near the window when there is lots of natural sunlight. I do not use any special lighting. I set my camera (Canon Powershot G3, 4 mega pixel) to auto-mode, turn on the macro function, turn off the flash and just point & shoot. That's all I know about photography, guess, I can't really give any advice in this area ;p
I do look at many cookbooks, especially those with beautiful photos to get an idea how to compose the photo, I also look at photos posted at flickr. My only advice: to improve your photos, all you need to do is to practise, practise and practise. Hope this helps :)

Yuri said...

Hi HHB, you've been tagged again, http://yuribake.blogspot.com/2008/03/second-tag-of-day.html.
About the kueh-like problem we've both encountered, very sad huh *sob, sob* we'll have to keep trying... I tried your Strawberry Yogurt Cake, I had a funny feeling it was almost going to be kueh-like. I didn't blog it as I was not happy with the result :P

MH said...

Your chiffon cake looks stunning, (especially the side), so nicely remove from the pan:)

Lin said...

I'm bcoming a fan of your blog! Hope to see more baking coming up!!! Jia You. - Lin

KWF said...

HHB, according to my teacher, my failed chiffon cake is due to uneven oven temperature, which I have no control over :( Does your oven gives you the same problem? coz I think we're using similar oven.

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Yuri, I have a feeling it was due to the cup to gram conversion of the flour. Mine was the other way round, I had better luck with the Strawberry Yoghurt cake!

MyHomeKitchen, thanks! I happened to have a very thin-bladed knife...guess it is so thin that the sides were not 'peeled-off' ;D

Thanks Lin, hope to see u around more often :)

Hi KWF, my oven is a Tefal 20L which looks something likethis. The oven temperature is not very accurate...it starts to drop after I put in the baking pan...sometimes by 20degC! and there are hot-spots in the oven...meaning some parts get browned faster than the other. So I usually have to turn the pan to ensure even browning.

Becky said...

These are gorgeous photos. I see that lots of my favorite food bloggers have been using matcha powder recently. Do you know where I could go about getting some?

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Becky, I got my matcha powder from our local supermarket. You can try getting it from Amazon, the brand that I am using is "Ujinotsuyu Matcha Hagoromo". Just do a search with this brand name you should be able to view the product. Hope this helps :)

shiyan said...

Hi HHB

Nice creation!. I like anything with green tea. =) I think green tea mousse and tiramisu sounds yummy too! :P

For the air bubbles, maybe you can try running a knife through the batter round the tin to get rid of them. I do that most of the time, but sometimes, i still get huge holes within. *oops*. Ha ha...

Adding on to the memes that you have, I would like to give you this Spreader-of-Love award ( http://mybakingandfoodobsessions.blogspot.com/2008/03/spreader-of-love-award.html ). May the love spread far and wide. =)

Cheers

Unknown said...

Hi there, It all looks so lovely that my friend Kev and I were hoping we could use the recipe and pic as one of the recipes on our matcha website. Let me know what you think!
Ben

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Ben, thanks for the compliments! Can you let me know the addess of your website as I can't access it via the blogger profile link. Thanks!

Ruby@Cuisine said...

What a beautiful chiffon cake!

Unknown said...

Hi again, I was still hoping to use your recipe on my matcha website, but as the website is still under construction and basically not in an ideal state for our little company to be judged, I didn't want to put its address in a public blog just yet. I could of course give you the address in your personal email. Let me know what you think.

Quinn said...

Try tapping and banging the chiffon pan batter in pan real hard on the floor before it goes into the oven. Might get rid of the bubbles that had caused the holes. I read this somewhere in a cookbook.

Anonymous said...

Made this twice already. It's really nice. I use green tea paste instead of powder. Just love the smell of it. Recipe definitely a keeper.

Unknown said...

Hi - ihave just tried your recipe, although mine didn't raise as tall, does that mean i have deflated the egg whites when folding?

also the base of the cake is a bit wet, do i need to increase baking time?

THANKS!!

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Joyce, it sounds like you have under baked the cake, the base shouldn't be wet. It could also be this reason that the cake didnt rise that much, but it could also be due to the beating of the egg whites and/or the folding of the egg whites. Did you pre-heat your oven? Is your oven temperature accurate? Do you 'know' your oven very well? I know that my oven is always on the 'cool' side, so I always have to set the temperature 20degC higher than the recommended temperature. I'm not sure whether I have answered your questions?

Unknown said...

thanks HHB, yes i reckon my oven is on the cold side as well. so do i prolong the baking time? or i turn up the heat?

thanks again!

Happy Homebaker said...

Joyce, setting the right oven temperature can be quite tricky...I guess you will have to test it to find out. Personally, I would try to turn up the heat instead of baking it at a lower temperature for a longer period.

Unknown said...

thanks for your advice! i will try it out!

Anonymous said...

Hi! I love reading your blog and all the nice looking pictures, your kids and hubby sure are lucky! Was wondering..can I make a chiffon cake using a normal cake pan instead of the one with a hole? WIll the effect be the same? Thanks!! Hope to see more recipes soon, please share more low fat recipes if you come across them :)

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Jeanette, you can try bake a chiffon cake using a normal pan, but the texture will be different. With a normal pan, I think the texture will be less fluffy/cottony...it will be quite similar to a sponge cake texture.

Anonymous said...

Hi HHB,
its me elaine :)
happy to surf ur blog... :))
want to ask if i wan to replace the chocolate chips to red bean issit possible? and how much do i need to put?

thanks
elaine

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Elaine, I used about a handful of chocolate chips. Maybe you can try with 3 ~ 4 tablespoons of red beans? do make sure your red beans are well drained though.

Anonymous said...

hi HHB,
if i was to use the Japanese Azuki Beans? is it possible?
by the way i have make the milo chiffon cake from your blog. its nice and soft :)

thanks
elaine

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Elaine, I am not sure what you have in mind when u say u want to use the Jap Azuki Beans? Do u intend to get the raw beans and cook your own? Or are u referring to the ready-made ones? I don't see a problem, just make sure that if u are using the ready-made paste is not too watery, and they tend to be sweet.

Trish said...

Hi HHB,

i tried your recipe for green tea chiffon..
i doubled your recipe, in the end i got a thick green tea paste..im afraid its too thick that i have problem folding the egg whites in, so i have no choice but to add more milk so that its slight more watery. And it turns out well!

becos i have some leftover dried blueberries, so i replaced them with chocolate chips..turns out to be a good combination.

i always like the way your chiffon cakes turns out..they are evenly browned and shaped. you have a good knife!
do you have a picture of the knife you using? i would like to buy one too.

regarding the big holes in your chiffon, maybe you can try this method. before you put the tubepan into the oven, try giving it a bang on the table. this will remove the air bubbles in the pan. it will not deflate the mixture.

May said...

HHB, the 50g sugar seems too much in proportion to the 2 egg whites. Can you confirm if it is correct or a typo error? thks alot.
You have been a very reliable source of help :)

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi May, no, there is no typo error.

anthony said...

HI,
I just tried this recipe, but is a faillure. I think we need kind of cake flour to make this Chiffon cake, please give me the amount of this flour.

Thx

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Anthony, I am sorry I do not know the amount of cake flour to use for this recipe. May I ask how did your cake turned out? Was it too dense? Besides the flour, could it be due to some other reasons?

Anthony said...

Hi Happy H.
Sorry for the late reply. The cake was complete unflated. During the bake, I remaked that the baking powder expanded the cake, then sundendly is unflated.

Happy Homebaker said...

Hi Anthony, did you invert the cake tin once you remove it from the oven? The chiffon cake has to be left to cool "inverted" otherwise it will deflate upon cooling.

Anthony said...

Hi Happy H.
You were right, I didn't inverte the mould. Thx a lot, I'll try again soon and I'll give you a result.

:)

Anthony