Matcha Chiffon Cake

Do you know what the most definitive indication of a woman's weight loss is? That one thing that tells you, "geez you've lost a bit recently."

Visible collarbones? Nope.

A thigh gap? Nope.

An arse that defies gravity? Nope.

No periods? That fine anorexia down to conserve body heat? Yes, but that's gone way too far. I'm talking quick fix here, no one drops down to anorexia proportions and goes back up in a week or two.

It's actually a women's breasts that tend to shrink first when losing weight. Breasts are pure fat, so it only makes sense that when the body is lean and mean, the first place to go is the breasts and pretty much nowhere else. Sorry thighs and belly fat, this is a more permanent storage solution for the body, so this is often the last to go.

What does this story have anything to do with matcha chiffon cakes? Well one of the finer points of chiffon cakes is that the lightness is due directly to the huge amount of stiff peaks egg whites used as well as the lack of heavy fat. Chiffon cakes, unlike most cakes, is made without butter and instead only oil, water and a splash of milk are used to moisture to the cake. This makes for a very light, fluffy and delicate flavour rather than the rich buttery flavour you'd associate with most cakes.

With this being said, chiffon cakes are quite plain in flavour and are always flavoured with something else. This recipe is easily adapted to contain other flavours though, like orange zest, lemon zest, pandan, vanilla and whatever else you can think of.

My cakes fell a little flat because I don't have a high cake tin. Since this cake is so light and has no real substance, it needs a high walled cake tin to cling to to support itself. You can buy specially made chiffon cake tins and things but I've never seen one for sale ever. Despite the lack of cake tin, they still had a beautiful rise and were soft and fluffy. This is the recipe I originally used. I just messed with the proportions a bit for lazy baker inside all of us, it still worked.

When I measure out this matcha powder, I normally sift it a few times to get out the tougher bits of tea. I find myself using a fair bit of matcha powder to make this cake but the flavour is delicious. For the neutral flavoured oil, don't use olive oil, it makes the cake have a really odd flavour due to its strong flavour. Vegetable oil is normally my go to for oil in cakes.

Beating stuff into stiff peaks is honestly the hardest part of this cake. Not so hard if you've got a stand mixer, or are willing to wash yours. I did mine the old fashioned way with a wire whisk and did the traditional test of standing it over my head. Jubi drew me a picture because I made this cake once over Skype.

I freaked out several times attempting this

Matcha Chiffon Cake

Uses: unsweet cake for Asians to enjoy.

Ingredients for the cake:
5 large egg yolks at room temperature
3/4 cup of caster sugar
1/3 cup of neutral tasting oil
2 tablespoons of milk
2 tablespoons of water
1 scant cup of plain flour with 2 tablespoons of corn flour well sifted in, aka cake flour
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of baking powder
25g of matcha green tea powder

Ingredients for the meringue:
5 large egg whites at room temperature
1/2 scant cup of sugar
Pinch of cream of tartar

All the usual suspects

Instructions:
1. Separate your eggs.

I should just reuse this photo constantly

2. Beat your egg yolks and sugar together until pale, thick and creamy.

Same for this photo

3. Start mixing in the oil a little bit at a time, while whipping vigorously. Very much like a mayonnaise. I don't know why I do this, you can just add it all in at once, I found it made only a small different to how fluffy the cake turned out.

Shiny, shiny oil

4. Mix in the water with the sugary mayo mixture.

5. Sift the crap out of your matcha green tea, flour and baking powder. I normally do this about three or four times depending on how lazy I feel. If there are any chunky bits of tea left behind, just throw them out.

One of the many siftings

The colour quickly evens out

6. Mix the matcha/baking powder/flour into the sugar mayo mixture. Start working on the meringue mixture and you will notice the mixture will start to turn a bit greener as the tea infuses.

Shiny/lumpy

7. Time to work on the meringue! Start whipping the egg whites vigorously.

Is this picture upside down?

8. When it hits soft peaks, add in the cream of tartar and start adding the sugar in a teaspoon at a time. Whisk vigorously after each addition.

Dump the sugar in!

9. You will notice the egg whites start to turn nice and shiny after the sugar. Once the egg whites hit stiff peaks, you are done.

This glossy

10. Fold the first third of the meringue into the matcha cake mixture. Fold carefully before folding the rest of the meringue.

Fold it in! Not with a whisk though!

First third!

11. Bake in a high walled 22cm cake tin at 180C for about 40 minutes, this cake doesn't turn golden brown. It really only get pale and springy when pressed down, do the skewer test and you should be sweet.

Last few thirds!

Give it a light tap and smooth out the top

Yeahhh do not use a bundt tin, that's not the same thing at all.

Whats the name of my blog again?

Oh and I didn't bother putting in pictures about the thigh gaps, collar bones or nice arse. Its actually quite NSFW/raunchy considering what I'm looking up, especially when you start venturing into thigh gaps and nice arses. If you need photos, you're already on the internet buddy, check out that stuff in your own time.