If you haven't heard me whinge on twitter about how worried I've been to try my oven, then hear me now! Our place has an oven that is probably older than I am; and older ovens don't have the best reputation of cooking things well. You have to find the hot spots, and get to know it well. To top it all off, the temperate gauge is in Fahrenheit, and the numbers are all faded off! This has caused me to write them on, and use my iPhone for conversions every time I want to bake something.
So I thought, the real test to see how this oven is going is to bake a cake.
I'd been wanting to try Poh's orange chiffon cake she made on her first episode of her show; Poh's Kitchen.
I always begged my mum to buy a sponge cake whenever I went to the Asian grocery shop with her. Weather it be the orange one, or the awesome looking green pandan flavour. They were always so light and fluffy. For YEARS I had not had a sponge from the Asian grocer. I can't even remember the last time we had one.
To see the video of Poh making this cake: www.abc.net.au/tv/pohskitchen/stories/s2768097.htm
The only thing I hate about making cakes is lining the tin. Luckily for me, you don't need to line the cake tin for this one! The combination of coconut milk and vegetable oil doesn't require you to line the tin. The recipe even stresses to not line or grease the tin. Yippee!
I decided to leave out the layers of cream for 2 reasons:
- I couldn't be bothered
- The only cream my waistline needs is a firming and toning cream
I was almost going to leave out the ganache as it smelt so amazing as I unmolded it from the tin. However Hamsley insisted there be ganache as I had already prepared the hazelnuts to go over the ganache.
The end result: just like those cakes mum used to buy me (you know, minus the chocolate ganache and hazelnuts). So light, and incredibly fluffy, maybe not as tall as the ones we used to buy, but the flavours and textures were all spot on.
I made the correct amount of ganache, but if I had made the cream layers, the cake would have been higher, and I wouldn't have had so much excess ganache.
I can't wait to try this recipe again but doing a pandan flavour. If I can only ever make one cake again, I'd be happy if it was this one!
Orange Chiffon Cake
Poh Ling Yeow
5 egg whites (at room temperature is best)
1/2 tsp cream of tartar
75g caster sugar
5 egg yolks
7 tbs coconut milk
5 tbs vegetable oil
75g caster sugar
5 tbs orange juice
1 tbs orange zest
150g self raising flour, sifted
400ml full cream
2 tbs icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla paste or extract
150g hazelnuts
150ml full cream
200g good quality dark chocolate chopped or broken into small pieces
1. Preheat oven at 160°C fan forced/180°C regular.
2. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar with an electric mixer till soft peaks. Add sugar one tablespoon at a time a beat thoroughly after each addition till you achieve stiff peaks. Set aside.
3. In a separate bowl whisk egg yolks with caster sugar till fluffy. Add coconut milk, vegetable oil, orange juice, zest and self raising flour and whisk until combined. Gently fold the egg whites into the yolk mixture 3 batches.
4. Pour into a 22cm baba cake tin (do not use non-stick and do not grease). Bake 25 mins at 160°C fan forced or 30 mins at 180°C, or till skewer comes out clean. Leave oven on to roast hazelnuts.
5. When cake is out of the oven, immediately invert the cake still in the tin, and place on a cooling rack and leave to cool completely (about 1 1/2 hours).
6. Meanwhile, place hazelnuts on a shallow baking tray and roast until the skins are easily flaking off when rubbed, about 7 mins. Remove from the oven and pour onto the middle of a clean tea towel. Fold sides over the nuts and rub till all the skins have flaked off. Transfer the nuts onto a chopping board and chop to desired texture.
7. To make filling, whip the cream, sugar and vanilla till stiff but do not overbeat as cream will split. Cover with cling film and refrigerate until required.
8. When cake is cooled and ready to be assembled, run a knife around the edges of the tin and invert. Slice cake with a serrated knife into 3 equal layers. Spread a layer of the chantilly cream on each layer and sprinkle with chopped hazelnuts.
9. To make ganache, bring cream to the boil in a small saucepan. Remove from heat, add chocolate pieces and whisk till chocolate has melted and emulsified with cream. Using a spatula spread evenly over cake and sprinkle with additional chopped hazelnuts. For a tidier outcome, it’s best to ice the cake over a cooling rack so the extra ganache drips away.
Serves 8-10
Yum - looks divine. I will have to try it!
Glad you are back :-)