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Dessert

Roll Jelly Cake

A cake baked thin, spread with jelly while hot, and rolled up.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Des Moines. Plymouth church. [from old catalog] · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Tea and lemon work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 610 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Roll Jelly Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Do not beat the eggs separately; mix the sugar, eggs, flour and baking powder all together as quickly as possible.

  2. Beat the yolks and sugar till very light.

  3. Add flour and whites alternately.

  4. Just before putting in the oven, stir in the boiling water.

Bake and fill

  1. Bake in a large bread pan.

  2. Bake in a quick oven.

  3. Have the cake one inch thick when done; then cut into pieces.

  4. While hot, spread on the jelly, which is to be well beaten before putting on the cake.

  5. Roll in a napkin.

  6. Spread between the layers and ice over the top.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

594Calories
20 gProtein
7 gFat
112 gCarbs

Counts 4 of 5 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Des Moines. Plymouth church. [from old catalog]. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Tea + lemontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together610 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Provide structure and lift when whipped into the batter.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it sets.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps the yolks whip to a light texture.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the heat, helping the cake rise.
Boiling water
Adds moisture and helps make the batter light and tender.

The step that matters

Mix the batter quickly. Baking powder starts releasing gas as soon as it is wet and heated, so a slow mix loses lift. Working fast keeps the batter airy and the cake light.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, flour, egg, tea):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Figfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, flour, egg, tea. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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