Imitation of Buche de Noel

Think what! I baked a cake! You must be thinking so what to cheer!!!... But for me it’s definitely worth to cheer...I always have a secret desire to become a good and perfect baker, mainly in the field of cake. But I am feeling sorry to disclose the secret that every time I baked a cake I proved myself the most worthless baker of the world. This time I didn’t know how I baked this nice and really tasty cake for the first time in my life and feeling soooo proud to share with everybody. Of course the half of the credit goes to my lil daughter who nagged so much in the late evening for a cake that her desperate mom has taken one of the difficult actions of her life.

My husband was away from home for a week on his job tour. I was attending my daughter all alone far away from our native land. So on that day it was not possible for me to go out and buy her a cake. The only choice I had, was to satisfy her with a homemade cake.

Now a days my book shelf is getting loaded with a handful of cook books and the majority reigns are of cake baking books. Most of the time I satisfy my appetite only gazing at the attractive, mouth-watering cakes, but never dare to try those in my kitchen. Since surfing through the cake recipes, one recipe just won my heart and I started to prepare it in my dreams only. That day when my daughter’s nagging crossed my tolerance power, I suddenly got the determination to take a risk and hit the recipe. I convinced my mind that if again it would be a failure no one was there to witness. My daughter was still in her innocence and hubby was out for his tour. So I could easily trash the failed dish.

But to my wonder it was a grand success. Grand success in the sense that a poor baker like me was lastly able to prepare a tasty and nice looking cake..

Here following is the recipe. I am copying the ingredients of the real recipe which I followed and marking what I used and not used. I will be explaining the method how I prepared.

Ingredients:-

Cake:-

All purpose flour- ¾ Cup
Baking Powder- ½ tea spoon
Ground Cinnamon- ½ tea spoon ( I didn’t use)
Baking Soda- ¼ tea spoon
Salt- 1/8 tea spoon
Egg- 3 large
Sugar- ¾ cup
Vanilla extract- 1 ½ tea spoon
Fat Free Milk- ½ cup (room temperature)
Confectioners’ sugar- 3-4 table spoon
Non-dairy whipped topping -2 cups (I didn’t use it, instead I used the frosting)

My addition- Cocoa Powder- 1 table spoon

Frosting:-

Light tub Cream Cheese (Neufchatel) - 8 ounces
Confectioners’ sugar- 1 cup (I used granulated sugar)
Unsweetened cocoa powder- 1/3 cup
Vanilla extract- 1 tea spoon
Semi sweet chocolate (melted and cooled slightly) - 2 ounces

My addition- Crushed Nuts for the toppings.

Note: - To bake this cake you will need a jelly-roll pan. A jelly roll pan is similar to a plain baking trey or a cookie sheet, but it has sides. The sides on most jelly roll pans are 1 inch (2.54 cm) deep. Jelly roll pans are used for roasting vegetables, baking cookies, coffee cakes, jelly rolls etc. You can view the images of excat jelly roll pans HERE. I didn’t have a jelto prepare this cake.

Method:-

1. First prepare the pan to bake the cake. Grease the pan then put a wax paper or a cookie sheet. Pls note, cut the cookie sheet in this way, so that all the four sides of the cookie sheet should over lap the trey and the sides of the trey. Grease the cookie sheet too. Spray slight flour too on the top of the sheet.

2. Pre heat the oven to 375F.

3. Now in a bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; mix well. In another bowl combine the eggs, sugar, and vanilla and beat on high speed until light and fluffy, 4-5 mnts. Add the flour mixer and milk in 2 alternating additions each until just combined.

4. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Just make  ½ inch layer. If you have excess batter you can reserve and store it in an airtight container for a next cake.

5. Bake the cake until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean, 8-10 mnt or more. Spread a kitchen towel or a big trey on a work surface and cover it with a piece of wax paper. Now cover the wax paper with edge of the pan to loosen the cake and invert the pan and warm cake onto the wax paper. Now you will have two wax papers on the both sides of the cake.

6. Now the trick. Roll up loosely the warm cake very carefully in a jelly roll style. Don’t press much. Put one hand under the cake and with light touch and press, roll up along with the wax papers. Allow to cool completely, about 45mnts.

7. Meanwhile, to prepare the frosting, in a bowl, place the cream cheese, sugar, cocoa powder, and vanilla. Beat on low speed until just combined, increase speed to high and beat until smooth. With the mixer on low speed, add the melted chocolate (To melt the chocolate put them in to the microwave for a minute or so. Keep on checking that they should not get over melted or too hot); increase the speed to high and beat until smooth, 2-3mnts.

8. Now unroll the cooled cake carefully and remove the top wax paper. Spread the frosting topping over the cake and again roll up jelly-roll style (Instead you can spread whipped cream or any kind of icing made by you).When you will roll the cake, roll it with the help of the bottom wax paper and while rolling slowly remove the wax paper.  Place the cake seam side down on a serving platter. Put the remaining frosting all over the cake leaving the both ends. The garnish with the nuts. Put in the refrigerator for an hour (or more) to get the frosting set and to get an easy cut for nice shaped slices.

Note:-  Always roll the cake with the help of the wax papers. I tried with hands but the cake was getting cracks. Two wax papers on the both sides worked very good in rolling the cake.

About The Taste:-

The taste of the cake reminds me the taste Chocolate Crunch of Monginis. The sourly tinge of cream cheese blends marvellously with the chocolate and created a soft smoothness in each bite.

About Buche De Noel:-

Here I have imitated the recipe of Buche De Noel. It is a traditional A chocolate cream- cheese frosting dessert served during the Christmas holidays in France, Belgium, Quebec, Lebanon and several other Christian-populated francophone countries as well as in the UK. As the name indicates, the cake is generally prepared, presented, and garnished so as to look like a log ready for the fire. Here are few snaps of Buche De Noel which I downloaded from Googleimages.com.ly roll pan. I got some use and throw silver foil trey which came out very handy

 

Recipe reference :-

 New Complete Cook Book by Weght Watchers