Mamon tostada — also called mamon tostado or toasted mamon — is a Filipino chiffon sponge cake that is baked twice, so a soft cake dries out into a golden, crisp snack. The small cakes are baked in molds, left to air-dry, then returned to the oven until they crisp the whole way through.
It keeps the eggy sweetness of an ordinary mamon chiffon cake but eats like a biscuit, which is why it is commonly sold in tubs and bags as pasalubong and eaten with coffee or tea. It belongs to the same family of double-baked Filipino snacks as biscocho.
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Recipe
Mamon Tostada
Ingredients
Method
- Combine the flour and oil to make a mixture. Use this to lightly grease your molds.
- Sift together cake flour, powdered sugar, baking powder, and salt into a container. Set aside.
- In a mixing bowl, beat egg whites at low speed until foamy. Add cream of tartar and continue beating at medium speed. Gradually add sugar, one tablespoon at a time, until stiff peaks form.
- In another mixing bowl, mix egg yolks, vegetable oil, fresh milk, and vanilla extract until frothy. Gradually add the sifted cake flour mixture in 3 to 4 batches. Mix after each addition.
- Beat the mixture at medium speed until it becomes lighter. Gently fold in the meringue in 2 to 3 batches until well combined. Be careful not to overfold.
- Fill the prepared molds with more than half of the batter. Tap gently to remove air bubbles and level the batter.
- Preheat your oven to 170°C or 350°F. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the top turns golden brown. Let it cool before carefully removing from the molds.
- Place the Mamons in a tray upside down. Let them sit for a few hours or overnight. Then, bake them again in the oven for 20-25 minutes until the body turns golden brown.
Grease the molds with the flour-and-oil mixture.- Sift the cake flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.
- Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks.
- Whisk the yolks with oil, milk and vanilla.
- Fold the meringue in, 2 to 3 batches.
- Cool, then stand them upside down before the second bake.
How mamon tostada differs from mamon and from a muffin
They share a shape and nothing else. Mamon is a chiffon sponge baked in muffin-shaped molds: its lift comes from egg whites beaten to stiff peaks and folded in by hand, not from a muffin’s quick stir of flour, raising agent and liquid. Mamon tostada is that same cake taken one stage further — dried out and baked a second time until it is crisp. Ordinary mamon is soft and eaten fresh; mamon tostada is dry, keeps far longer, and snaps instead of squashing.
Getting the meringue right is most of the recipe
The meringue decides whether this works. Beat the whites to stiff peaks and stop there — carry on and the mixture turns grainy, and the cakes rise quickly in the oven only to sink again.
Separate the eggs while they are still cold, when the yolks are firmest and least likely to break into the whites; stray yolk fat hinders the meringue and can stop the whites whipping up properly. Bring everything to room temperature before you mix, which blends the batter more smoothly, and fold the meringue in gently and in batches so the air you just beat in survives.
Molds, filling and the second bake
The method fills each mold past the halfway mark, and about three-quarters is the sensible ceiling, because the batter expands as it bakes. Metal molds brown the outside more readily; silicone works too, but usually needs longer in the oven to reach the same colour.
The second bake is what separates mamon tostada from mamon. Once the first bake has cooled, the cakes go upside down on a tray and sit for a few hours or overnight so surface moisture escapes, then go back into the oven until the body turns golden and dry through.
How to store toasted mamon
Kept airtight in a cool, dry place, mamon tostada stays crisp for up to about ten days. Let the pieces cool completely before you pack them: sealing them while they are still warm traps moisture and turns them chewy, which undoes the second bake.
Questions about toasted mamon
Can you make toasted mamon from store-bought mamon?
Yes — slice ready-made mamon thinly and dry the slices in a low oven until they crisp. It is the usual shortcut. Cakes baked from this batter crisp more evenly, because they are shaped and dried for it from the start.
Why is my mamon tostada still soft in the middle?
Usually the drying stage. The hours the cakes spend upside down between bakes are what let moisture leave the centre; cut that short, or pull them out of the second bake while the body is still pale, and the middle stays soft.
Is toasted mamon the same as biscocho?
No, though both are twice-baked Filipino snacks. Biscocho is made from bread, coated with sugar and butter or garlic and butter; mamon tostada is made from sponge cake and is plainer and lighter.
Want more in this vein? Try otap or pacencia for other crisp Filipino baked snacks, pan de coco and putok for soft ones, or the salted caramel brownies and walnut brownies.
