When one ingredient spoils it all - Pandan Red Bean Mochi Cake

I was SO excited to finally find pandan extract at 99 Ranch. I don't go to Asian markets a lot.. maybe one to three times a year.... yes I know.. I'm Asian, and this is the reason why one of my resolutions is to cook more Asian foods. Anyway, the other day I made it to the closest 99 Ranch to San Francisco... in Daly City! It was an experience. I spent over an hour in there browsing aisles after aisles... trying to figure out what that package contained...checking my phone for all the recipes that I wanted to try and buying at least half of the things on the ingredients list...yep.. my pantry is much more ready for Indian food than Vietnamese.... sigh.

Any who, I forgot to read the label on the pandan extract....then came home.. and well... what the heck is "propylene glycol?"  ... and omg it's imitation? ( Side note: Propylene glycol definitely stood out for me because it came up when I was studying for boards... its reaction to benzodiazepines can lead to thrombophlebitis... Talk 'bout the random factoids I had to learn!) ... So what was that doing in my extract? Apparently it's used a lot in a variety of things... the whole idea of that bottle seemed so toxic! But I wasn't too worried since I was going to add maybe 1/4 tsp of it... max.  Pandan is a really different flavor... the whiff I got from the bottle was beyond sickening... but I believed in the manufacturers... and added just a smidgen to my recipe... a recipe I've done before... but with matcha green tea.. not pandan. Big mistake. It made me sick eating it.. I wanted to throw up... and I had to just dump the entire thing. I spent a few hours slaving over my red beans... because I was so excited to make this dessert... so much effort.. wasted. :(

This recipe is great!.. just don't add imitation pandan extract :)... add Matcha powder if you want more of a flavor!

http://www.tinyurbankitchen.com/2010/02/red-bean-mochi-loaf.html

*Apparently Propylene Glycol is also in imitation vanilla extract, and I have minimal hesitation from that... who would have thought.. I used to use that for years.. until I mustered up my courage to buy a huge bottle of the the good stuff..