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Dessert

Roll Jelly Cake

A baked cake rolled with jelly after baking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Roll Jelly Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Beat the eggs until very light.

  3. Add the sugar, then the cream or melted butter.

  4. Sift together the flour and baking powder, then gently fold into the mixture.

  5. Spread the batter very thinly in shallow pans lined with parchment paper.

Bake and roll

  1. Bake for about 12 minutes.

  2. Turn the cake out of the pan immediately and remove the paper.

  3. Spread the warm jelly over the cake and roll it up while still hot.

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.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + flourtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Egg and flour 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
Whipped to a light foam that gives the thin sponge its structure and lift.
Sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps hold the whipped eggs in a stable foam.
Flour
Provides the starch and protein that set into the cake's structure as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas when heated, helping the thin batter rise and stay light.
Cream or butter
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the thin sponge tender and flexible for rolling.

The step that matters

Turn the cake out immediately and roll it while hot. A hot sponge is pliable because its starches are still soft; once it cools it stiffens and cracks when rolled around the jelly. Spread the batter thinly so the bake is quick and the cake stays flexible.

“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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