As a Malaysian Indian living in the US, food is one of my realest ties to that side of my identity, so this summer I wanted to bring some of those flavors into my baking. My family visited from Malaysia and brought me a precious gift: pandan extract. I hadn’t been able to find it anywhere near me, so I was genuinely thrilled. What I really wanted to recreate were the soft pandan roll cakes from back home, but I figured I’d test the flavor out on something simpler first.

The cupcakes

The pandan flavor came through beautifully — that grassy, almost vanilla-adjacent smell filled the kitchen the second the extract hit the batter. The cupcakes themselves turned out okay, but a little dry. I think I overbaked them by a couple minutes trying to make sure they’d set properly without eggs to help bind everything. Lesson noted for next time.

The gula melaka icing

I wanted to top them with a gula melaka icing — that deep, caramel-like palm sugar that shows up in so much Malaysian dessert — to balance out the pandan. The flavor was exactly right: rich and almost smoky-sweet. Texture was another story. As it cooled, it went from icing to something closer to jelly, more suited to a spoon than a piping bag. Still tasted like home, just… a texturally adventurous version of it.

What’s next

This was really a flavor test run before I attempt the real goal: a proper eggless pandan roll cake, rolled thin and filled with cream the way I remember it. Now that I know the pandan extract behaves and roughly how much to use, next time I’m chasing moisture over precision — and maybe icing that stays icing.