Homemade Kaya

香兰咖椰

Kaya is a sweet and creamy/custardy jam made from coconut milk, eggs and sugar. It is served in toast with butter in most coffee stalls. Kaya comes in two flavours: pandan or caramel. I'm sharing the recipe for pandan kaya which is less sweet. 

Ingredients

6 large eggs (355g nett)

360ml fresh coconut milk

100g sugar

5 pandan leaves

Method

1. Prepare pandan extract: Cut pandan leaves into small pieces and put into blender with 100ml of the coconut milk. Sieve the mixture, squeeze the pulp to extract as much pandan liquid as possible. Discard the pandan pulp thereafter.

2. In a container/bowl, lightly beat the eggs and sugar until sugar dissolves. Sieve the egg mixture into a small pot, add in the pandan extract and the remaining coconut milk. Stir using a small whisk to combine.

3. Set up bain-marie: Prepare a big pot and put a steaming rack in it. Fill up with water until it just covers the steaming rack. Place the small pot with coconut egg mixture on the steaming rack (so just a small amount of water touched the bottom of the small pot), turn on the stove heat and bring the water to a boil. Then lower heat to medium-low and keep stirring the coconut egg mixture in one direction. Note: High heat will cause the coconut egg mixture to curdle and kaya will be lumpy.

4. It took me 1.5 hours to cook down the mixture and get my preferred thick and custardy texture and consistency. Remove the small pot from bain-marie once done and continue to keep stirring at room temperature to cool the kaya down. Once completely cooled, store in a clean and sterilised jar and refrigerate. Best consumed within 2 -3 weeks.