Pandan (Pandanus amaryllifolius) is the long, blade-like green leaf of a small tropical screwpine, prized across Southeast Asia as the aromatic and natural green colour of its sweets and rice. Bruised, knotted, steeped or blended to a juice, the leaf gives off a warm, sweet, grassy and nutty scent with a note that reads to the nose as jasmine rice, popcorn and freshly baked bread — the reason it is often called the vanilla of Southeast Asia, though the two plants are entirely unrelated. That fragrance comes overwhelmingly from a single molecule, 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, the very same compound that scents fragrant basmati and jasmine rice and the crust of new bread. The leaf perfumes coconut rice, kaya jam, chiffon and pandan cakes, jellies, kuih, drinks and desserts from Thailand and Malaysia to Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Sri Lanka, and is wrapped around marinated chicken to be fried.