Recipe - How To Make Kaya Jam (Coconut Egg Jam)

You know the saying, when life hands you a lemon, make lemonade. So what do you do when life hands you  a coconut ?  You make kaya, of course.

Coconut trees thrives in the tropics and Singapore used to have lots of coconut trees 50 years ago.

Kaya is a bread spread (jam) made from eggs, coconut milk and sugar with pandan leaves for flavouring. The bread spread or jam is sweet and creamy with a hint of coconut and eggs. It goes fabulously well with toast and a slab of butter. Hence the name kaya toast.

Kaya toast goes along very well with a cup of coffee and soft boiled eggs for breakfast. Many Singaporeans cannot start the day without a kaya toast, judging by the popularity of  eateries that specialised in kaya toast, such as Yakun, Killiney Kopitiam, Good Morning Nanyang Cafe and others.

kaya about to ready

Ingredients:
12 eggs, beaten
250 grams sugar
250 ml coconut milk
1 bunch of pandan leaves (about 6 - 8 leaves)

Method;
Mix the eggs, sugar, coconut milk and pandan leaves well in a small pot.
You need to double boil this for about 1 and half hours.
In a bigger pot or wok, boil the water up to about 90 degrees C, just below the boiling point.
You need to stir the mixture continuously, especially when the eggs start to cook and stick to the pot.
The pandan leaves gives the green colour.
The kaya is about to be ready when lumps start to form.

I made 2 small tubs (picture above), and lasted a month in the fridge.

My kampong life with coconut trees

This 6 minute video shows how to make kaya



Another video showing how to make kaya the short cut way



Another video on making kaya. She uses 5 eggs, 250 ml coconut milk, 230 grams sugar and blend the pandan leaves to get the essence.