YES! This time, I baked this perfect 20cm ultra soft strawberry chiffon cake using 500g strawberries! This is a lot of strawberries!!!
If you do a Google search for strawberry chiffon cake recipe, you will find heaps making vanilla chiffon cake sandwiched with strawberries and cream. Or you will find bright pink-coloured strawberry chiffon cake recipes that are made with pink food colouring, artificial flavouring (also known as strawberry essence or strawberry paste) and some strawberries but definitely not 500g strawberries in one 20cm cake!!!
Look at my cake. I didn't add any pink food colouring or artificial flavouring into my strawberry cake. There is also no strawberry flavoured milk or yogurt added into it. It is 100% natural. Yet, I can taste the strawberries in it because it is maximally loaded with strawberries. Very soft and moist... Simply beautiful and delicious!
My Perfect Ultra Soft Ultra Moist Strawberry Chiffon Cakethat is maximally loaded with strawberries!
How can I incorporate 500g strawberries into one 20cm chiffon cake? How can the cake remain so soft and cottony even with the large amount of strawberries added?
I cooked and reduced the strawberries! Just like how I baked my Perfect Ultra Soft Blueberry-loaded Chiffon Cake at HERE. And I don't puréed the strawberries so that I can taste bits and pieces of strawberries in every single bite of my cake. Look at my cake again and you will see smears of strawberry pieces embedded in it.Unlike my Perfect Blueberry Chiffon Cake at HERE, I had to bake this strawberry cake a little differently because strawberries have more water content and less pigmentation than blueberries and so this means that I can and have to add more strawberries in order to bake a perfect strawberry chiffon cake. Guess what? The magic number is 500g!Based on my observations, adding more than 500g strawberries into chiffon cake can make it less fluffier, heavy or even wet and dense as the cake won't rise with the heavy weight of strawberries. On the other hand, adding less than 500g strawberries will make the chiffon cake fluffier but it will have less detectable strawberry taste. Plus, the cake will be rather yellow and less pink.
Hence, I would say that 500g strawberries is the best optimal amount that I can incorporate into this cake. Can't be more as there is some big bubble starting to appear in the cake.
Another few important things to mention before proceeding to the video and recipe... 1) Please do not omit the addition of lemon as it helps to thicken the strawberry mixture and retain its vibrant color so that the cake will be more pink and less brown.2) It is a must to use the right weight of cooked strawberries to bake the cake because different batches of strawberry might have different amount of water content. The cooking process on different days and climate might vary slightly too. If you are afraid that you might end up with lesser than 250g cooked strawberries, you can use slightly more than 500g to cook in the beginning. It is always good to have slightly more than less.Here's my video showing how I baked this all-natural flavoursome cake.
This ultra soft cake will shrink slightly after baking and it's ok.
I can see a few large bubbles in this cakebut its texture is still so cottony soft and nice.
The cake is not overloaded with sugar and so it not too sweet.
It is a little tangy with lots of strawberry flavours.
Just right and perfect for us!
Another thing that I noticed about this strawberry cake... It browns slightly less than my Perfect Blueberry Chiffon Cake at HERE and my Perfect Cherry Chiffon Cake at HERE because there is a lot lesser natural sugar in strawberries (5g per 100g) than in blueberries (15g per 100g) and cherries (8g per 100g). So now we know, strawberry is a great ingredient to use for sugar-conscious baking.
Baking this pink fruity cake is making me feel somehow Christmasy... LOL! Maybe because Christmas is approaching soon in about one month time. Have you started your baking for Christmas? If you wish to bake more ultra soft chiffon cakes for this festive season, you may wish to know that I have many ultra soft chiffon cake recipes at HERE.
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Here's the recipe.
IMPORTANT: Please use the exact weight and make sure that all ingredients are at room temperature.Makes one perfect 8-inch (20 cm) chiffon cake
For the strawberry:
more than 500g strawberries, hulled and chopped - this is the weight after hulled
2-3 tbsp lemon juice, freshly squeezed
Place strawberries and lemon juice in a saucepan and cook mixture with medium low heat. Stir constantly and cook until the strawberries release their juices. Allow mixture to simmer for about 30 mins or until mixture is reduced to half of its volume. Mixture should looks like thick strawberry jam. Remove from heat and set aside to cool completely.
The cooling process will cause the mixture to lose more moisture while cooling so it is important to weigh the cooked strawberries when they are completely cooled. The cooked mixture should be slightly more than 250g. If the mixture is 300g or more, you will have cook the mixture more to reduce it further.Weigh out 250g and use it to bake the cake later.IMPORTANT: 1) Please do not omit the addition of lemon as it helps to thicken the strawberry mixture and retain its vibrant color so that the cake will be more pink and less brown. 2) It is a must to use the right weight to bake the cake because different batches of strawberry might have different amount of water content. The cooking process on different days and climate might vary slightly too.For the egg white mixture:
210g egg whites (about 6)
100g caster sugar
For the egg yolks mixture:
90g egg yolks (about 5-6)
50g neutral tasting vegetable oil
250g cooked strawberry - see above
80g plain / all purpose flour
40g corn flour
1/4 tsp salt
Preheat oven to 160°C.
For the egg white mixture:
Using an electric mixer with a whisk attachment, beat egg whites in the lowest speed for at least 10 mins to stabilise the mixture.
While the mixture is beating, prepare and whisk egg yolk mixture.
For the egg yolk mixture:
Using a hand whisk, combine egg yolks and oil in a large mixing bowl until combined and slightly pale. Whisk in the cooked strawberries. Sift in both flours and salt. Whisk gently until the batter is smooth and combined.
Back to the beating of egg white mixture:
Increase beating speed to the next higher speed. While beating, add sugar gradually. Increase beating speed to another higher speed and continue to beat until stiff peaks form. The meringue should be very smooth with tiny bubbles. Do not over-beat the mixture.
Using a hand whisk or a spatula, gently fold in the egg whites to the egg yolks mixture in 3-4 batches. It is ok to mix the 1st batch of egg white more vigorously into the egg yolk mixture but the subsequent portions must be folded in very gently. Make sure that most of the white is not visible after folding.
Pour batter into an un-greased 20 cm chiffon tube pan. Give the pan a gentle tap.
Chiffon baking options:
Basic - Bake at 160°C for 50 mins or until it is thoroughly baked. IMPORTANT: This cake has to be baked for at least 50 mins in total.
With slits - This chiffon cake baking strategy will help the cake to rise uniformly rising with minimal cracks. The cake will also have a deep flavoursome top and surrounding crust.
Bake at 160°C for at least 15 mins or until a "skin" has formed on the cake surface and just before the cake surface starts to crack.
At the 14th minute, remove the cake out from oven. Cut 6 or more slits on the cake surface and place the cake back into the oven immediately. Continue to bake at 140°C for another 50 mins or until it is thoroughly baked. Increase oven temperature to 160°C and bake for another 10 mins until the top skin of the cake is nicely browned.
Please do not bake this cake with too low oven temperature or a tray of boiling water (also known as steam bake). Detailed explanation is at here.
After baking, invert the cake immediately to cool on a wire rack.
Allow the cake to cool completely in the pan before removing it from the pan. Important: This cake is very moist and fragile. Do not unmould the cake by pressing it! To unmould, please use a blunt thin plastic spatula or knife to run along the cake's edges and gently push the cake out from the pan. Also, it is easier to slice with a serrated knife. Enjoy!Store uneaten cake in an airtight container for up to 3 days and the cake can remain so soft and moist even on the 3rd day of bake.
Happy Christmas Baking
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