peaches and cream swiss roll.

Finally finally finally! A swiss roll that didn't crack on me. Kudos to this recipe for helping me overcome the dreaded fissures. As much as I would love to claim that the recipe has no need to be modified and is perfect as it is already, it needs a few more tweaks to nudge it into perfection.

Although the sponge is ridiculously soft and fluffy, I found it slightly bland. It was neither eggy nor milky nor vanilla-y. It was also barely sweet but you can easily solve that problem by piling on the cream! Next time I might use melted butter instead of oil, and add more vanilla extract.

For the whipped cream, instead of just sugar and vanilla, I decided to add condensed milk too to make it milky and dreamy. I should have whipped it to stiffer peaks so that it doesn't ooze out of the swiss roll so easily when rolling. I wanted to roll the cake such that the centre is a perfect circle of cream with the peaches suspended in it and the sponge enveloping it all around. Kind of like this. Alas, it was easier to imagine than to execute it. The stiffness of the cream really is crucial. And one thing's for sure- never be too greedy with the filling!

Peaches and Cream Swiss Roll
cake portion adapted from this recipe

For the cake:
4 eggs, separated
90g sugar, divided
35ml oil or melted butter
50ml milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
70g cake flour

For the cream:
150ml whipping cream
2 tsp sugar
1 tbsp condensed milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

peach chunks, amount as needed

For the cake: Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 30 x 30 cm pan with parchment.

In a bowl, combine the egg yolks and sugar and whisk until pale, fluffy and thick, also known as the ribbon stage. Combine the oil, milk and vanilla extract in a small bowl. Stream in the oil mixture while whisking constantly. Whisk in the cake flour just until no traces of flour remain.

Whisk the egg whites to stiff peaks, adding the sugar gradually once the egg whites have begun to foam.

Whisk in 1/4 of the meringue into the egg yolk mixture to lighten. Whisk in the rest of the egg whites until the mixture is homogenous.

Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 18 minutes. When the cake is done, drop the pan from a height of 30 cm onto the counter to allow the cake to shrink away from the sides of the pan. Unmold the cake, make 3 shallow slits at one end of the cake and roll it up from that end. Allow the cake to cool in its rolled state before proceeding, about 30 minutes. If you want to, you can brush some syrup on the surface of the cake before rolling.

For the whipped cream: Combine the whipping cream, sugar, condensed milk and vanilla extract in a bowl and whip to stiff peaks.

After the cake has cooled, unroll the cake and spread the whipped cream evenly across its surface. Scatter the peaches on top and roll the cake up. Refrigerate for 2 hours before serving.