Matcha Chiffon Cake

Matcha chiffon cake is very popular in Korea and Japan. It is a very elegant cake with beautiful matcha smell and balanced mild bitterness and sweetness on top of its signature chiffon-like soft and light texture.

Matcha chiffon cake is a kind of angel food cake, where you use vegetable oil instead of butter, and also use meringue as leavening agents along with baking powder. Both the vegetable oil and the meringue will result in extra soft and moist texture.

Since meringue plays a crucial role in making the light chiffon cake, it is very important to beat the egg whites until it reaches 'stiff peaks', and not to deflate the meringue when you fold it into batter. Also, please make sure to invert the pan immediately after removing the cake from the oven, and let it completely cool before unmolding the cake to prevent deflation of the volume.

To enjoy the mild flavor of matcha, you don't need any icing or garnish. Just dust a spoonful of powder sugar on top.

Matcha Chiffon Cake
(Yield: one 6" chiffon cake, 6 servings / Cooking time: one hour*)
* One hour cooking time doesn’t include 3-4 hours of cooling time.

Ingredients:
+ 3 eggs*
+ 50g sugar (20g for egg yolks, and 30g for meringue)
+ 40g vegetable oil
+ 40g water
+ 60g cake flour
+ 3g matcha (fine powder green tea)
+ 1.5 tsp baking powder
+ a pinch of salt
+ (optional) 1/8 tsp cream of tartar**
+ powder sugar for dusting


* You will need only two egg yolks, but still need all the egg whites from three eggs for meringue.

** Cream of tartar is an acidic powder which is a byproduct of winemaking. It is often used as a stabilizer for egg white foam. Although you can use lemon juice or any other acid as a stabilizer, most cooks prefer cream of tartar which has no water content, no flavor and no smell. For French meringue, which is made without any heat, I would definitely recommend adding cream of tartar. If you are making Italian meringue, which is the most structurally safe meringue, I don't think you need to use cream of tartar.

Procedures:
1. Preheat your oven at 335°F (168°C).

2. Please separate egg yolks and whites. Please be careful not to break egg yolks... egg whites should not have any trace of egg yolks - even a small amount of egg yolk will hurt your egg white foam (meringue).


3. Mix two egg yolks with 20g sugar and whisk until the color of egg yolks change to pale yellow. Then, add vegetable oil and water, and whisk well. Sift cake flour, matcha, baking powder and salt into the egg yolk mixture. With the whisk, mix just until all the ingredients are combined.


4. Now it is time to beat meringue. In a clean bowl*, with a clean balloon whisk*, whip a room temperature egg white until you can see foam. Add 1/8 tsp of cream of tartar and continue whipping. When the egg white doubles in volume, sprinkle 30g sugar gradually in 3-4 batches while whipping the egg white. Egg white will gains more volume as sugar is added. Whip the egg whites until it reaches stiff peaks. This is "French meringue", the shiny velvety egg white foam.


* If there is any trace of fat (including egg yolks) on your bowl or whisk, the egg white foam will not form very well.

5. Add 1/4 of meringue into the matcha batter (from #3), and mix well to lighten the matcha batter. Then, start folding rest of meringue into the batter in three to four batches.


6. Pour the batter into an ungreased 6" tube pan. (I used paper tube pan). With a stick of chopstick, swirl the poured batter gently to remove any trapped air bubble and also to smooth out the top of batter.


7. Place the pan over a baking sheet and bake in a preheated oven for 40-45 minutes until cake tester comes out clean.


8. As soon as the cake is baked, take the pan out of oven and invert the pan immediately. Let the cake completely cool for about 3-4 hours before unmolding, to prevent any deflation of volume.


9. Unmold the cake and dust the top with powder sugar. To dust the powder sugar evenly, spoon powder sugar into a small sieve, and tap the sieve with a small spoon. Please use serrated knife to slice the chiffon cake.



Enjoy~