C is for Coffee Swiss Roll

July 10, 2012

C is for Coffee Swiss Roll

I've certainly had my caffeine fix today having sampled some of the coffee swiss roll that I made. Its one of Mary Berry's recipes from her marvellous 'Baking Bible' cookbook (pg 45 to be precise!).

Before you get cracking, just check you have a swiss roll tin. I didn't - so I had to shoot down to Big W to buy one. Your tin needs to be the standard size for a swiss roll of 33 x 23cm.

One other thing I'll mention - don't worry if you don't have coffee essence. I just used instant coffee granules & dissolved it in the milk that goes into the buttercream filling by zapping the milk & coffee in the microwave for 10 seconds to dissolve the granules. If you do end up using instant coffee, be sure to taste the coffee buttercream so you can determine how much coffee you want in there. I ended up using 4 teaspoons of coffee granules & it certainly has quite a coffee hit! I think 3 teaspoons would do it to be honest. It'll also depend on how strong your coffee is so you'll have to experiment a little. If you want to add more coffee granules, then just mix them in with a few drops of milk & zap in the microwave again to dissolve before adding to your buttercream.

Ingredients

(For the cake part)

4 large eggs

100g caster sugar

100g self-raising flour

(For the coffee buttercream)

75g softened butter

225g sifted icing sugar

2 teaspoons milk

2 teaspoons coffee essence (or 2-3 teaspoons instant coffee granules dissolved in the milk)

What to do...

Heat your oven to 220C or if using the fan, heat to 200C.
Prepare your tin by lining it with non-stick baking paper AND spraying it with cooking spray.
Whisk the eggs & sugar together until really frothy - you want to see thousands of air bubbles! I ended up using an electric whisk as I'm rubbish at whisking for long periods of time - mustn't have enough muscles in my arm!
Sift the flour & then carefully fold into the egg mixture until combined. This took a bit longer than I expected as I kept turning up bits of flour so just make sure all the flour has mixed in well.
Turn the mixture onto your prepared tin & then tilt the tin both ways so that the mixture goes into each corner. Then give it a light shake so that the mixture levels out.
Bake for around 10 minutes until golden brown & the cake has started to shrink from the edges of the tin.
While the cake is in the oven, tear off some baking paper larger than the size of the tin & place it on your bench. Then sprinkle a good layer of caster sugar over the top.
When the cake is cooked, carefully flip it onto your sugared baking paper. Then remove the tin & carefully pull away the baking paper from the cake.
Next, get a sharp knife & cut a line off each edge of the cake to remove any crusty bits & to ensure its nice & even for rolling.
Now you need to score the shortest end nearest you so that it rolls nicely. To do this, cut half way through the cake an inch from the end. Be careful not to cut right through.
Leave the cake to cool while you prepare your coffee buttercream.
To make the buttercream, mix together the butter, sifted icing sugar, milk & coffee essence (or remember my tip if you are using instant coffee granules).
Spread the coffee buttercream evenly over the cake. Now I'll say at this point, that its up to you how thick you spread the buttercream. I like lots of filling so I used all but around a tablespoon of the buttercream. However, I did find once I had rolled it that there was quite a bit of buttercream in the middle. Not necessarily a bad thing! But just bear in mind that the middle (i.e. the scored end that you start rolling with) will have twice as much buttercream as the rest.
Now for the rolling - DON'T BE AFRAID. Remember the cake is on non-stick baking paper so it will be easy to roll with your hands. If you want to put the roll straight onto a serving plate, then have this ready at the end of your cake & baking paper so you can lift it straight on once its rolled. Carefully bend over that first bit of the cake that you cut part way through. From there, you should be able to start rolling the cake. You want a tight roll but be gentle as you go.
Just as you are about to finish rolling the cake, if you have your serving plate ready, then you can just do the last roll & then gently lift it straight on to the plate.
Cut each end of the swiss roll to tidy it up & then you're ready to serve!

I sprinkled the top with a little extra caster sugar as I hadn't quite sprinkled enough on my baking paper to begin with.

There are a few different flavours you can use for the filling of a swiss roll. Traditionally, you would use strawberry or raspberry jam. You could have whipped cream AND jam in the middle or I don't see why you couldn't opt for something a little different & try passionfruit pulp or indeed another type of jam if you're not a fan of strawberry or raspberry. Adding cream as well just makes it more suitable as a dessert.

Enjoy! x