Sawaddee ka welcome to Hot Thai kitchen today is a special day because I am actually baking
and if you've been following the show you know that I've never actually baked on the show and I
really enjoy baking actually and I've even worked in a pastry shop before but baking isn't really a
big part of Thai cooking so it's just never come up on the show but what I'm gonna show you today
is the cake recipe that I have never had anywhere outside of Thailand so it's a western-style cake
but the way it's done is unique to Thailand okay so we're making caramel custard cake or in Thai
Caramel custard cake just with the Thai accent and so it's a fluffy light chiffon cake with an
orange flavor and instead of frosting it's got a creamy layer of creme caramel or flan on top
it is out of this world it was my favorite cake as a kid and so now I'm gonna share it with you let's
get started so first thing first I have to prep my pan so the oven is preheating at 350 degrees
Fahrenheit and this cake is gonna be baked in a water bath so I'm gonna prep that first what I
like to do and let the water heat up in the oven while the oven is preheating it just needs to come
up to about half an inch because we just need to sort of make it go up as high as a layer of
custard so that's good I can always add and then I'm gonna put this in the oven so there are three
layers to this cake the caramel the custard and the cake okay so first let's make the caramel I'm
just making a dry caramel like you would when you make if you've ever made a creme caramel so I've
got some sugar and I'm just gonna heat it up until it's melted and turns into a nice amber color now
the color of your caramel up to you I like it quite dark because I like that intense sort of
almost a slightly bitter flavor but if that's too much for you you can do a light golden color while
my caramel is cooking my cake pen is actually heating up in the oven so that way when I pour
the hot caramel into the pan it doesn't cool the caramel down too fast and so I have a lot of time
to spread the sugar around making it even so you don't want to be stirring this all the time but I
do want to stir it enough to distribute the color so any dark spots you can stir the dark spots a
little bit and watch it carefully okay cuz it burns fast all right I'm gonna turn that off I'm
pretty happy with that color to get my cake pan out quickly I'm gonna pour the caramel on into
my cake pan very quickly swirl that see if your pan is cold it'll cool down pretty quickly and
makes this very difficult to do bubbles I don't want bubbles little bubbles are no problem at
all you just don't want big momma bubbles hanging out all right one layer down two more to go the
second layer is the custard now it's a very simple custard I've got four egg yolks here and I'm gonna
add some sugar you want to beat that up quickly if you pour sugar over yolks and you don't heat it up
beat it up right away it'll start to coagulate the yolk or cook the yolk now I've got that I'm going
in with evaporated milk now in Thailand we don't really cook with regular milk or fresh cream very
much most of our milk products that we use are shelf-stable the condensed milk and evaporated
milk and evaporated milk is great in iced coffee or iced tea is just so rich and creamy love it
we'd drizzle it over ice cream and a little vanilla and just stir that until all the sugar
is dissolved and that's as simple as it gets so set this aside don't pour it over the caramel yet
because if you're not ready to bake right away as it sits the caramel will start dissolving into the
custard so you want to leave this until the very end all right last layer that cake so this cake is
sort of a chiffon cake it's light its leavened mostly by whipped egg white but it's a little
denser than the traditional chiffon because it has to be strong enough to hold a layer of custard on
top so let's get started with the dry ingredients I've got some cake flour and baking powder so it's
not just egg white that's doing the leavening also a little chemical leavener and also some
salt when I started learning how to bake I often forgot salt and I could tell right away first
bite I'm like ah forgot the salt and you can't taste it really but when you're missing it it's
so obvious such a flat sweetness that's not very satisfying yeah you want to sift that especially
when you're using cake flour cakes are so fine that it has a tendency to lump like that more
so than all-purpose next we're gonna mix up the wet ingredients so I am making this cake orange
flavored it's my own little trick I love the way the orange flavor lighten and brightens up the
richness of the flan on top so I've got an orange which I'm going to zest with this microplane and
be sure not to get out the white stuff because that's a bit bitter so just enough to get the
dark or just skin out with this orange you're gonna juice it we want that juice yes I know this
is a lemon juicer but I'm gonna make it work all right now I'm gonna mix all of my wet ingredients
together I've got two egg yolks yes you will have about three egg whites left over when all is said
and done but that's okay you can have it for breakfast some sugar get the sugar dissolving
a little bit now I'm gonna add some vegetable oil and this cake is really quite a low-fat cake
there's no butter there's only three tablespoons of oil and total smell that's so bad as far as
cakes go oh that looks good already now the orange juice a touch of vanilla vanilla and orange really
do go well together I'm just gonna pour the wet into my dry standard batter mixing be gentle in
the beginning so you don't kick up flour all over the place and because we're using cake flour it's
a very low protein flour so you don't have to worry too much about over developing gluten and
making it tough so you can really go crazy so at this point you want to whisk until you've got no
more lumps of flour okay mmm smells so good orange flavored cake is my all-time favorite flavor when
it comes to cake all right and now for the pry marry leavening agent I'm gonna whip up some
meringue so basically some egg whites I mean I'm using this oversized bowl because it's the only
thing I've got that'll work so three egg whites in here and then I'm gonna also add a little bit
of cream of tartar which is just an acid that will help stabilize the egg whites and a help improve
volume now that your egg whites are foamy you can start drizzling in sugar a little bit at a time
you want a stiff peak so if you pull it up and you've got this cute little peak that just that
doesn't bloop you know droop all over the place then you're good to go don't overbeat it because
otherwise you know ruin the egg whites okay almost done one last thing to do it's going
to incorporate the egg whites into the base here give this a quick stir one more time so 1/3 of the
meringue goes in just roughly 1/3 what you're doing at this stage is you're just lightening
up the base so that it doesn't deflate the rest of the egg whites case so now that it's sort of more
or less mixed in we can go in with one more batch and so if you notice my right hand is doing the
exact same motion every time and I'm just turning the bowl that's all I'm doing this is one thing I
learned from my pastry chef last batch of meringue and you want to gently fold in the egg whites as
opposed to stir it in or beat it in so that you preserve all those air bubbles because those are
gonna be what lifts up your cake now this time you want to make sure there are no streaks of white
left when that is achieved stop right there okay time to put it all together I've got my custard
which I'm going to pour through this tiny little sieve just to make sure you know there's lumps of
something or other it doesn't you know it catches it beautiful and now I'm gonna pour the batter
directly over this and your if you're thinking what don't worry because the batter is so light
it will float on top of the custard it's all about density right so you want to just gently pour it
in and because of all that air that you whip in the custard will remain on the bottom if there
are large bubbles that you can see I just like to run like a toothpick or something small so you
don't get big balloons in the middle of your cake it's not a big deal you don't want to overdo this
because you don't want to deflate the whole cake but whatever you can see so the keg is minutes
from being done now unfortunately there is no real way of testing the doneness because the last part
that's gonna be done is the custard in the center so if you tried the toothpick test when you pull
it out the cake will wipe your tester clean so in and if there's a little bit of liquid in the
bottom there's no way for you to tell so I'm just gonna go by time and the color of the top of the
cake in my experience 45 to 50 minutes and the top of the cake would be nice and golden brown
and you want to flip it as soon as it come out of the oven because if you wait too long the thing
about your fun cake is that they shrink as they cool hey all chiffon cakes do that and so if you
wait too long it will shrink too much and then the base will be too small to support the top so
you want to get everything ready when the cake comes out you're ready to flip oh look at that
okay this is the moment that makes me nervous so I'm gonna take my spatula here and run it
along the side okay don't worry about the rough edges not gonna be too much of a problem okay so
I'm turning and I see that it's sort of rotating against the pan so that's a sign that it's sluis
I'm gonna pull this off the edge a little bit put a plate on top make sure it's centered put
your hand on the bottom and flip oh I heard it this is very lopsided so I try to push it with
my pan to get it centered as much as I can and moment of truth oh my god and there's gonna be
a bit of a suction going on so just jiggle jiggle-jiggle tada whoa oh we're so exciting
that's beautiful so just clean off the face a little bit perfect so now what you wanted
so now the caramel is gonna soak in the sides and you get the caramel flavor becoming sort of
like the crust of this cake now this is the hardest part you're gonna let this cool and
chill it this is so much better when it's cold so you're gonna just you know control yourself
for the next few hours put it in the fridge and we'll come back and cut it up you don't
understand how excited I am I have been wanting to make this ever since I was a kid because the one
you by never have quite enough custard on it so I've always wanted to make it so that I can make
it with the right amount of custard so it's nice and chilled I'm gonna go ahead and cut it up oh
my god check that out oh my god it's beautiful the right ratio of custard to take it is crazy
like you you will not have had anything quite like it if you like custard and you like cake
this is the perfect marriage the top is super creamy with that burnt caramel flavor and the
bottom is just fluffy and soft with that hint of orange flavor that just works to brighten
everything up oh my god look here you you have to try this in you're a baker you have to try
this if you're not a baker you should learn how to bake them so you can make this recipe is that good
and this just brings back childhood memories but it's better because now I've got the right amount
of custard so of the recipe as always is on hot tight kitchen comm if you make this send me a
photo on Facebook Twitter or Instagram and I will see you next time for your next delicious time you
that'll help stabilize the egg whites and a help improve volume just a little bit of it with eye