Froggy Pandan Ogura Cakes

I really love the soft, cottony texture of ogura cakes, so I absolutely had to try the pandan version! I was inspired to bake ogura froggies for my little kids and couldn't resist experimenting patterning with ogura batter. I adapted the recipe from Cooking Pleasure for pandan zebra ogura but halved the original recipe which was for a 9-inch tin. I pre-piped the eyes, mouth and cheeks and then baked the ogura cake over them. Don't the froggies look happy basking in the sun? :) Pandan ogura is really fragrant and melt-in-the-mouth!

Ingredients (makes three 4” inch bowls and one 6” square tray)
3 egg yolk + 1/2 egg
32.5g corn oil
30ml coconut milk
10ml pandan juice
32.5g cake flour
Pinch of salt

3 egg whites
37.5g sugar
1/5 tsp cream of tartar

Method
1. Preheat oven to 150^oC. Prepare a tray of water at the bottom of the oven (I used the lowest rack to bake the cake).
2. Whisk egg yolks, whole egg, corn oil, coconut milk, pandan juice and salt until well combined.
3. Sift in flour and stir till smooth batter formed.
4. Aliquot out 6 tsp of batter for patterning and divide batter 2:1 (brown: pink). Add 1 tsp of cocoa powder to the brown batter and a tiny dip of wilton pink coloring for the pink batter. Add 1/3 tsp cake flour to the batter and mix well.
5. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar until foamy using an electric whisk. Add in sugar in 2 additions and beat until firm peaks are formed (or just reach stiff peaks). The peak formed doesn't flop over but it's not overly stiff either. Scoop over meringue over into patterning batter (2 tbsp per tsp batter) and fold gently.
6. Fold in the rest of the meringue into the pandan batter gently in 2 additions.

7. Pipe the brown and pink batter onto the bowls and tray respectively (top panels in picture) and bake for 1.5 min. 

8. Pour the pandan batter into the glass bowls and square tray till ½-2/3 full (middle panels). Bang the bowls/tray on the counter top 3 times each side to get rid of big air bubbles.
9. Steam bake at 150^oC for 40 min or when skewer comes out clean.
10. Remove from oven and invert immediately on cooling rack.
11. Unmould gently with hand and peel off baking sheet when the cakes have cooled completely.
12. Carve out the the eyes and hands from the layer cake using a combination of cookie cutters and knife carving. “Glue” the parts onto the froggy cakes using melted white chocolate (bottom panels).

Don't the froggies look happy basking in the sun? :) Pandan ogura is really fragrant and melt-in-the-mouth!

With love,

Susanne