Swiss Swirl Ice Cream Cake

I almost opted out of this challenge for a couple of reasons.  I have been making a lot of ice cream lately.  And secondly, how would I ever eat all of this.  But it was looking like so much fun that I had to join in.  It is Roxanne's birthday, so I will take this to the office and share it.

I haven't made a jelly roll, or Swiss roll as it is called in this recipe, since I taught grade nine home economics.  This should be fun.  Also, I have kumquat ice cream in the freezer from an earlier time and I will use it.  I made a simple ice cream custard using my favourite recipe.  I had lots of chocolate mousse left over from the last challenge so I took it out of the freezer and added it to the custard after it had thickened.  After processing this chocolate custard in my ice cream maker, I chopped up all the chocolate pavlovas I had in the freezer and folded these crispy bits into my chocolate ice cream.  Then I put it in the freezer until I was ready to make the bombe.

The July 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Sunita of Sunita's world – life and food. Sunita challenged everyone to make an ice-cream filled Swiss roll that’s then used to make a bombe with hot fudge. Her recipe is based on an ice cream cake recipe from Taste of Home.


The Swiss rolls

6 medium sized eggs
1 cup berry sugar + extra for rolling
6 tablespoons all purpose flour
5 tablespoons of natural unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted together
2 tablespoons boiling water
a little oil for brushing the pans

For the filling
2 cups whipping cream
1 vanilla pod, split and scraped to use seeds only (or 1 tsp vanilla extract)
5 tablespoons caster sugar, berry sugar, superfine sugar or powdered sugar

1. Preheat the oven at 400 deg F approximately. Brush the baking pans ( 11 inches by 9 inches ) with a little oil and line with greaseproof baking paper. If you have just one pan, bake one cake and then let the pan cool completely before using it for the next cake.
2. In a large mixing bowl, add the eggs and sugar and beat until very thick; when the beaters are lifted, it should leave a trail on the surface for at least 10 seconds.
3. Sift the cocoa powder with the flour.
4. Add the flour mixture, in three batches and fold in gently with a spatula. Fold in the water.
5. Divide the mixture among the two baking pans and spread it out evenly, into the corners of the pans.
6. Place a pan in the centre of the preheated oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes or till the centre is springy to the touch.
7. Spread a kitchen towel on the counter and sprinkle a little caster sugar over it.
8. Turn the cake on to the towel and peel away the baking paper. Trim any crisp edges.
9. Starting from one of the shorter sides, start to make a roll with the towel going inside. Cool the wrapped roll on a rack, seam side down.
10. Repeat the same for the next cake as well.
11. Grind together the seeds scraped from the vanilla pod and sugar in a food processor until nicely mixed together. If you are using vanilla extract, just add the sugar and extract to the cream.
12. In a large bowl, add the cream and vanilla-sugar mixture and beat until very thick.
13. Divide the cream mixture between the completely cooled cakes.
14. Open the rolls and spread the cream mixture, making sure it does not go right to the edges (a border of ½ an inch should be fine).
15. Roll the cakes up again, this time without the towel. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge until needed, seam side down.