Like a Southeast Asian vanilla: New Yorkers try Singaporean restaurant’s pandan cake + kaya and love it

SINGAPORE: When residents of the Big Apple tried out a popular Singaporean treat recently, it turned out to be a hit.

Staff from Singapore Social, a new restaurant in New York’s East Village, went around Washington Square Park to give New Yorkers a taste of pandan cake with kaya jam, as shown in a TikTok video from @singaporesocial_nyc on Sep 9.

“We make our Pandan chiffon cake freshly in-house, along with our homemade Kaya, a coconut jam that we love to eat with bread,” the video caption reads.

Pandan chiffon cake is “a Singaporean classic,” a member of the team explained to the taste-testers, adding that the cake is green due to the colour of the plant and telling them that the jam is made of coconut.

Another described it as “more of a Southeast Asian vanilla.”

Taste-testers were asked to take a piece of the cake and dip it into the kaya jam, and then just let the magic happen.

The people who tried the combo all looked more than pleasantly surprised.

Reactions to the pandan plus kaya ranged from small happy moves to an expletive-laden phrase.

“I really like it,” said one young woman, while a man said, “No, it’s insane. It’s so good. Super soft and fluffy.”

“This is so my jam,” added another woman, who noted how the cake seemed like other sponge cakes, but the jam’s nutty taste appeared to elevate it for her.

Another said she loved the combination of flavours.

A taste-tester gave one of the highest praises a dessert can get: “It’s not too sweet,” while another said the coconut taste was really strong.

When asked to rate the treat, they all gave it 9s and 10s.

“We are running out of cake. Everyone wants cake; this is crazy,” the staffer said as the video ended. /TISG

Read also: Local words recognised: Alamak, kaya toast, tapau, and nasi lemak made their way to the Oxford English Dictionary