Strawberry-Rose Roulade

Oh, the delicious Roulade. This fancy sounding dessert is basically a jellyroll wearing high heels, all dolled up for a night on the town.

For me, making Roulades is soothing. A good thing to embark on when you’re in need of some Zen…kind of like the yoga of the pastry world. There is a gentle nature in their preparation, and they come together fairly quickly.

Another thing I like about Roulades is that they are easy to play with in terms of flavor combinations and tastes. I’m a flavor flirt, so I love this versatility of Roulades.

My first date with a Roulade was full of strawberries and rose…literally. I combined strawberries and rose extract with a cloud of lightly sweetened, softly whipped cream. Then, I layered the Strawberry-Rose Cream onto the Lemon-Scented Genoise Cake that I had baked earlier (in a sheet pan so it was flat).

The final step is to roll up the cake, which creates lovely swirls of cake and filling that are both beautiful and delicious looking. You can’t help but want to dive in for a luscious bite.

To accompany the Roulade, I made a fresh strawberry sauce and sugared rose petals for decoration.

Strawberry-Rose Roulade

6 large eggs

7 oz sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

3 ½ oz sifted cake flour

¼ tsp salt

3 oz unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 tsp lemon zest

1 pt strawberries

8 fl oz whipping cream

1 Tbsp sugar

¼ tsp rose extract

Confectioner’s sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line a half sheet pan with parchment.

Place eggs and sugar in bowl of stand mixer and set bowl over simmering water. Whisk constantly to keep eggs from scrambling. Heat mixture to about 110 degrees, or until eggs are warm and sugar is dissolved and no longer grainy to the touch.

Whip egg mixture on high speed until very light in color, thick and holds a ribbon (~10 minutes). Blend in vanilla and lemon zest.

Sift flour and salt together 2 times. With a strainer, sift 1/3 of the flour over the egg mixture and gently fold in with a whisk, spatula, bowl scraper, or your hand. Repeat 2 more times until all flour is used. There should be no streaks or lumps of flour. Whisk a generous scoop of batter into the melted butter, incorporating completely. Fold this butter mixture back into the batter. Immediately pour batter into prepared pan, using offset spatula to smooth into an even layer.

Bake cake ~ 15 minutes, until golden firm to touch and a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean.

Slice strawberries thinly (bite-size). Whip the cream, sugar and rose extract together. Fold in strawberries.

Dust top of the cooled cake with the confectioner’s sugar and place a piece of parchment on top. Flip cake out of pan onto a work surface, with a long side facing you. Carefully peal the parchment off the top. Spread filling evenly over the cake, leaving a 1” border all around. Starting with the long side closest to you, fold the edge over the filling, and then roll the cake into a log, pulling up and forward on the bottom parchment to help you roll the cake. When finished, the seam should be on the bottom. Trim ends. Lift roulade onto serving platter. Refrigerate at least 2 hours before slicing.

(From The Art and Soul of Baking by Cindy Mushet, adapted by crc).