Bf came over to bake a Christmas log cake with me last weekend. I initially thought it was going to be easy because it is just Swiss roll with decorations, how difficult can it get right? I was totally wrong. The cake failed the first time round and failed again on our second attempt. Whyyyyy?!?! We still haven't figured that out. Nevertheless, I shall share the recipe I used. You can try and see if it works for you.
Chocolate Swiss Roll Sponge Cake
Ingredients:
30g unsalted butter
25g fresh milk
4 whole eggs, beaten
95g castor sugar
60g cake flour
15g cocoa powder
Method:
1. Sift cake flour and cocoa powder. Set aside.
2. Melt butter with milk over a double boiler or microwave. Set aside.
3. Beat eggs and castor sugar with high speed until light and creamy. Continue beating for another 1 minute using low speed to stabilize the batter.
4. Fold 1/3 of the sifted flour into the batter and mix well. Fold the remaining flour into the batter until the flour is well incorporated.
5. Scoop a small portion of the batter into the melted butter-milk mixture in step two and mix well briefly. Then pour the mixture back into the batter and mix well, until the butter and milk mixture and batter are well combined.
6. Pour into a 36cm by 26cm swiss roll pan and bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for about 12 minutes.
My cake turned out not spongy at all. I don't even know how to describe it. For the first attempt, we let it cool a bit before we spread the buttercream. During the rolling process, it cracked. For the second attempt, we rolled it up with grease paper and left it to cool. After that, we unrolled and spread the buttercream. This time it did not crack but still, the cake's texture is wrong. After some time, the roll becomes slightly flattened and not as round as it should be.
Buttercream Icing
Ingredients:
140g butter
280g icing sugar
5 tbsp milk
Method:
1. Beat the butter and half the icing sugar in a large bowl until soft and smooth.
2. Add the remaining icing sugar and milk. Beat the mixture until creamy and smooth.
*you may add food coloring at this step.
This was the easiest recipe I could find for buttercream. Our buttercream turned out not too bad! But it seems to be slightly different from the usual cream that bakeries use for their swiss roll. Maybe it was not chilled enough.
Decorations
After the cake was rolled, I coated the cake with generous layers of Nutella and created the log bark texture by going over it with a fork. That's probably the only thing that went excellent throughout the process. Haha. But when I tried transferring the cake to a nicer plate, the cake went BAM face down -_-" My woody design gone. Did the whole Nutella spreading all over again but wasn't as good as before.
I actually wanted to get some Christmas themed figurines to decorate the cake but ended up with items that are easier to get at the neighborhood supermarket. These are what I bought:
1. Cherries (Can substitute with strawberries)
2. Choco Wafers
3. Cornflakes (Can substitute with nuts)
4. Ferrero Rocher (Cut into half)
I also printed Christmas signs and attached them to a toothpick. The icing sugar sprinkled on the cake gives the snowy feel, and I think this is the crucial decor item.
Our final nice-to-look-at-but-inedible product:
Love baking with bf because he washes everything! ^_^ I want more baking sessions!!
