Monday, November 8, 2010

Blood Orange and Chocolate Truffle Swiss Roll

It's been awhile since I last made a swiss roll cake. I believe my last attempt was the Oreo Swiss Roll cake, which was almost 5 months ago?! Didn't realized it was that long. :P I have been browsing around and really admire some of the bloggers posting up really nice and special swiss roll cakes. I kept telling myself I am gonna make a swiss roll. soon no matter what! But....what flavor? I just archive it thinking the idea will come to me soon. Then just last week when I was doing some grocery shopping, I was really lucky to find blood oranges selling at the NTUC finest near my place. Okay, rewind.....did I say "blood", yeah I did. You didn't hear me wrong, it's blood oranges alright. :) Blood oranges are a special variety of orange which it's flesh has this bright crimson color. To justify what I meant, here is a shot of the orange I used:
Okay, not exactly blood red, but it is more deep in color and that is the name it was given. I haven't taste this fruit for a good 4 years now and now seeing it at my local grocer just brought back some fond memories of my life in California. I immediately bought 3 and ate one up once I got home, lol! It was juicy, sweet and much more intense in it's orange taste. ;) I decided to use the remaining 2 to bake something special. Some how Swiss roll just came back to my mind. :)
I bet your first reaction must be "Are you sure it's blood orange? It's looks more like Matcha & chocolate." Haiz! Beats me! Somehow the color is way off my expectations. So if you didn't smell or taste the cake, you might probably think I cheat you guys off with a pandan or matcha cake, lol! I guess this red coloring "problem" is around in most baking goods, well unless you used food coloring, then it's another story. For example, strawberry or dragon fruit bakes, usually didn't turn out as pinkish or reddish as we hoped. :P Nevertheless, this is a true blood orange cake but feel free to swap it with matcha or pandan, hahaha!
I pretty much suck at rolling up a Swiss roll. As you can see, it's not snug enough, or perhaps it's just me being greedy and stuffing too much cream in it. :P O well, learn as I go then. Okay, here is the recipe for this cake, feel free to substitute the blood orange with any ordinary orange. :) This is pretty much the same as my orange chiffon cake recipe.

Ingredients for Blood Orange & Chocolate Truffle Swiss Roll:
Egg yolk mixture:
4 egg yolks
100 ml. Blood Orange juice
15 ml. water
85 ml. corn oil
80 gm. sugar
75g Cake flour
75g plain flour
3 gm. salt
1 tsp. Baking Powder
Zest of 1 blood orange
1/2 tsp. Orange essence oil
Egg White mixture:
5 egg white
1/8 tsp. Cream of Tartar
90 gm. sugar

100g quality dark chocolate, melted and cooled
200ml non-dairy heavy cream, whipped
125g dark chocolate truffle

Method:
  • In a large mixing bowl, add in all of the egg yolk ingredients and mix well till everything is well incorporated and smooth.
  • Preheat the oven to 175C. Grease and line with parchment paper on a 13" by 14" baking tray. Grease the parchment as well.
  • In another mixing bowl, add in all the egg white and cream of tartar and beat using a mixer at medium speed till foamy. Without stopping the mixer, gradually add in the sugar and beat till stiff peaks.
  • Gently fold a quarter portion of the white mixture into the yolk mixture till well combined. Then add the yolk mixture to the white mixture and gently fold everything together till all is incorporated.
  • Take about 1/5 of the batter and mix in the cooled, melted dark chocolate and stir well till well blended. Scoop this chocolate batter in to a piping bag with an 1 cm opening tip.
  • Pipe the chocolate batter in diagonal lines across the whole tray. (Sorry forget to take pictures!) Then gently scoop the rest of the batter over the tray, making sure you don't mess up the chocolate diagonal lines.
  • Bake in the preheated oven of 175C for 13 to 15 minutes till tester comes out clean and the surface is golden brown.
  • Remove from oven and let cool completely on rack before removing the parchment.
  • Spread the whipped cream over the surface and line a row of chocolate truffles on one end of the cake and roll up from the shorter end into a swiss roll and tug it snug with a kitchen towel.
  • Place the cake in the fridge to chill for at least 1 hr before removing the kitchen towel to slice and serve. Enjoy!!
I made this for my parents when they asked us over for dinner over the weekend. Everyone loved it, including my sisters & the kids. My dad whom doesn't like cakes with cream, finished up his share happily. ;) The only down side of this cake for me is, it's kind of hard to cut the truffles after it's been chilled. :P
My girls love the cake, however they loved the truffle more. *sigh* You can get any kind of truffles, e.g. Meiji brand. Or if you are adventurous enough, make some yourself. But remember to use good chocolate for that.

Anyway, hope I have inspire you a little to think about baking up a Swiss roll cake yourself. It's all a matter of trying it yourself and practicing more when you get the chance. I know I need to! Okay, have fun baking and hope to hear that you too have roll up a Swiss roll soon. Cheers!



26 comments:

  1. An interesting combination! For home consumption, looks don't matter. Taste counts!

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  2. Bee Bee, when I 1st saw blood orange 2 or 3 yrs ago, cant recall, I was so curious and bot it immediately to try out even was quite x compared to normal oranges. However I was so disappointed, not sweet and not juicy. Now looking at your description, is it those I got was not good? hmmm... shd I give it another try when see in supermarket?
    If you dun tell, let me guess 100 times I also wont know is orange, the color of the swiss roll is green :D but still looks very inviting, I love the generous of cream, from all your bakes and cooks can tell you are very generous heeheehee...

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  3. delicious swiss roll and wat a surprising combi!

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  4. A very pleasant combination of flavours and texture! And it looks very pretty too.

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  5. You've just reminded me, I haven't made Swiss roll forbthe longest time too. The brown strip, did you pipe this across the cake pan?

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  6. I was hoping to get some blood oranges for the longest of time, since I started reading abt them from the net. But I haven't seen them here yet. I can't wait for the day that I get my hands on some.

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  7. Soft and pretty stripe swiss roll! I don't see blood oranges in our nearby NTUC, however, I only saw POKKA blood orange juice. Thanks for sharing the picture with us. This is interesting!

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  8. Hi there, I think I would love to address you as Bee like everyone else! Don't mind, right? Thanks for visiting my blog earlier and nice to meet you. You have a very very lovely blog here. I will scroll around after this. Love your fancy swiss roll especially the filling. I'm surprise that you only used cream of tartar, icing sugar and egg white in the cream making. Normally, other recipe they added in melted butter. Must copy down for later use. Thanks so much for sharing. Hope you're having a wonderful evening.
    Goodnight,
    Kristy

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  9. Blood oranges!! I saw them at the new mall near my office leh. I'm not so sure what to do with it but now I know..:) This swissroll must be very very delicious.

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  10. Blood orange swiss roll - you are so creative. I think a cake with a hint of citrus is nice :)

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  11. Your swiss roll is beautiful. Nicely rolled too. Thanks for sharing.

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  12. Thanks busygran! I actually got the idea of combining orange and chocolate from a local bakery store near my sis's place. Their orange chocolate cake is a hit!

    @Jess: I think you probably got unlucky that time when you first bought the blood orange. Because as far as I remember when I was living in US, the blood oranges I tasted are all juicy and sweet leh. Hopefully the next time you will have better luck choosing better ones. :P Lol! I know...greenish orange cake, weird horr!

    @jess@j3ss: Thanks so much. You should try this combo, it's actually pretty good!

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  13. @Angie: Thanks so much Angie! Hmmm..I think I need to improve on my rolling, lol!

    @Shirley: Yes, I piped the chocolate batter diagonally across. But after I piped, I realized it was too far apart. But too bad and too late...will try other more interesting patterns next round. Looking out for your swiss roll post!

    @Wendy: I think you can try out Cold Storage during this timing. Since it's seasonal and it's very short, you should go check it out now during fall. You won't be disappointed once you tasted it....well unless you are unlucky like Jess. ;P

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  14. You are most welcome DG! Hmmm...POKKA blood orange juice. You can go to NTUC Finest, not the usual NTUC. Finest carry more import stuff.

    Hi Kristy! Welcome to my blog too! Thanks so much! I love your blog too, you are a very talented cook! :) Do drop by again when you are free. :))

    Thanks Reese. I think you should buy a couple of blood oranges back and try them out. They taste kind of different too!

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  15. Thanks so much Tigerfish! Actually orange and chocolate is quite popular, just that I used blood oranges, lol!

    Thanks so much Jet! I think I still have room for improvement. :)

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  16. Hi Bee,
    Very nice swiss roll. Although can't see the blood orange color but I'm sure the taste is there. I made something similar pattern for my swiss roll last month too! But don't really have time to post it up yet. I would love to try out this blood orange flavor next round. Thanks for sharing!

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  17. Hey, I'm the webmastter of blood-oranges.com, thanks for linking!

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  18. hi bee, blood orange sounds so scary!!i dont think i've seen any of those..do they label them as blood oranges?? must try them if i happen to see these oranges.

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  19. What a fun and beautiful cake! I never thought of striping the cake before! Bet it tasted delicious!!!

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  20. Your swiss roll with brown strip, look so nice. Thanks for sharing.

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  21. Hi Grace,
    So good to hear from you again. Hope everything is well on your side. Busy? Remember to take a break and bake something nice yah? Thanks! Actually the blood oranges taste almost like an ordinary orange so no worries if you can't find them. :)

    Hi Tiago! It's my pleasure! Love your site, very informative. ;)

    @Lena: Hahahaha! I know, who would associate blood with a fruit?! But that's it's name, no doubt about that. You should try it sometime. :)

    Hi Ravenous Rowie ! Thanks for visiting my blog and leaving a comment, appreciate it! Hope you will come again. ;)

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  22. Wow! The Swiss rolls look gorgeous. Love the swirls in it. I used Navel oranges in my recent post. Shall try getting my hands on Blood oranges for more intense color and a perfect goody like yours.

    Best wishes, take acre.

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  23. I managed to get some red navel orange a few days ago but they are not as red as blood orange. They taste a bit like big pomelo :)

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  24. hey bee bee,

    this is interesting. I have heard of and came across blood oranges but have yet to buy and try them out. Initially thought they would be like grapefuit, very bitter but turns out that they are even sweeter than normal oranges.

    I wanna have a slice of this swiss roll. still got chocolate truffles somemore, shiok! your rolling is not too shabby la, at least it doesnt crack. Mine breaks all the time, haha. (I suck at rolling more)Nvm, we'll improve together =]

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