Pumpkin Spice Swiss Roll

Pumpkin Spice doesn’t actually contain any pumpkin. It’s a mix of spices that is usually used to flavour pumpkin pie. Made from a combination of nutmeg, cloves, all spice, cinnamon and ginger, it screams autumn (pun absolutely intended) and is everywhere at this time of year.

Pumpkin Spice is synonymous with coffee now, but it also makes for a delicious spiced cake. Here, I’ve used it to flavour a Swiss Roll sponge and filled it with a white chocolate cream cheese frosting, and the combination is delicious.

The basic sponge recipe has come from my old cookery book (see here for more info) I’ve just updated the techniques and added the Pumpkin Spice mix and colour. It’s a strange recipe, containing no butter. You cook your eggs whilst whisking them over a pan of hot water and slowly add the other ingredients to it. It takes a little while to make and will certainly give you impressive arm muscles unless you have an electric whisk, but it’s the best sponge for a Swiss Roll as it bakes quickly and remains firm, spongy and crack-free.

So don’t let all the whisking put you off, it’s an easy recipe to make and tastes delicious. Serve with a cup of tea and a few back-to-back episodes of Sabrina The Teenage Witch.

Happy Halloween.

Ready in 40mins + cooling (20mins making the sponge, 10mins bake, 10mins assembly + cooling) – Makes 12-15 slices.

Ingredients:

• 3 free-range eggs
• 75g of caster sugar
• Orange food colouring (mix red and yellow if you can’t find orange) – optional
• 75g of self-raising flour
• 1 teaspoon of ginger
• Half a teaspoon of nutmeg
• Half a teaspoon of cloves
• Half a teaspoon of all spice
• Half a teaspoon of cinnamon

• 75g of white chocolate
• 25g of unsalted butter
• 50g of cream cheese
• 100g of icing sugar

Method:

• Grease an oven tray or large, cake tin with butter and line with baking parchment.
• Pre-heat oven to 180c / 160c fan / gas mark 4.

• Half fill a pan with hot water (not boiling) and sit a large bowl on top. Make sure the bottom of the bowl isn’t touching the water.
• Break the eggs into the bowl and whisk for 2mins.
• I’ve sat my pan on the hob, as it’s heat proof, but the hob is not on. You don’t want to heat the water up as you whisk, the residual heat from the hot water in the pan will be enough to gently start to cook the eggs.

• Add the sugar and food colouring if using, and whisk for another 8-10mins, until the mixture has lightened in colour, increased in volume and is the consistency of softly whipped cream.

• Take the bowl off the pan and continue to whisk until cool.
• Then sift the flour and spices into the egg mixture.

• Fold in gently with a metal spoon. You don’t want to knock the air out of the eggs.

• Pour the mixture into your prepared tin and tilt it so it spreads into the corners. You want a square / rectangle shaped cake so you get a neat roll.

• Bake for 10mins until firm, well risen and golden.

• As soon as the sponge is out of the oven, use the baking parchment to lift it out of the tin, onto a flat surface.
• Place clean, dry kitchen roll onto the top of the sponge so it doesn’t stick to itself and roll the whole thing up, starting on a long side.
• Don’t try to peel the parchment off at this stage, just roll everything up into a sausage shape. The sponge will be hot, so be careful.
• Place a damp kitchen towel or a few pieces of damp kitchen roll on top to stop it from drying out and allow to cool completely.

• Once the sponge is cool, make the frosting:
• Place the white chocolate and butter into a heat-proof bowl and melt, either in a bain-marie or for 30-40secs in the microwave.
• Whisk together the cream cheese, and icing sugar, then add the melted chocolate and butter.

• Carefully uncurl the sponge and remove the kitchen roll from the middle. Don’t try to flatten it back out, we want the sponge to curl up easily again.

• Spread the cream cheese frosting evenly across the sponge, spreading it right out to the edges.

• Re-curl the sponge, trapping the frosting inside, peeling off the parchment as you do.
• Wrap the parchment back around the outside of the Swiss Roll to keep it held together and chill in the fridge for 30mins.

• Remove the parchment, trim off the crisp edges and slice.

• Store in an airtight container in the fridge until ready to serve.

If you liked this recipe, you may also like:

Caramel Apple Muffins

Courgette Cake

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