Lemon & Cream Cheese Swiss Roll

I had long wanted to try to make a Swiss Roll and decided to do so using lemon as a flavouring with cream cheese.

I used a recipe that I found on BBC Food but I adjusted the amounts of ingredients as i used a larger baking tin.  I also changed the filling.

The sponge for the roll is fairly easy to make, though a little tricky to roll without cracking.  The filling, which can be buttercream, cream, jam or anything else is easy too.  With mine I must admit that the cream cheese did not thicken as much as I would have liked, but after chilling in the fridge was certainly ok.  The lemon hit comes from lemon curd spread onto the sponge before rolling as well as the zest in the sponge.

I must say that it tasted really wonderful, though next time I would use buttercream instead of the cream cheese, simply because it is more robust as a filling.

Lemon & Cream Cheese Swiss Roll – video

Ingredients:
for the sponge:

• 4 medium eggs(large in USA)
• 145g plain flour
• 145g caster sugar
• zest of one lemon

For the filling:

• 180g cream cheese
• 200g icing sugar
• 125g lemon curd
• 2 tbsp lemon juice(leave this out if you want the filling to be thicker)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/180C Fan/400C.
2. Line a 33cm by 26cm baking tray, with a 5cm edge, with parchment paper and grease the top side of the paper.
3. Put the eggs, sugar and the lemon zest in a heatproof bowl and place over a pan of gently simmering water.
4. Whisk with an electric whisk until the mixture is pale, creamy and thick enough to leave a trail when the whisk is lifted.
5. Carefully remove the bowl from the heat and continue whisking for a further five minutes.
6. Sift in half the flour and, using a large metal spoon, lightly fold it into the egg mixture.
7. Sift in the remaining flour and fold into the mixture – it’s important to use gentle movements to retain as much air as possible in the batter.
8. Pour the mixture slowly into the prepared tin and gently spread with a spatula so the base of the tin is evenly covered.
9. Bake for 10–12 minutes until well-risen, pale golden-brown and firm to the touch.
10. Place a damp tea towel on the work surface and cover with a sheet of baking parchment.
11. Dredge with the four tablespoons of sugar – this will help stop the outside of the sponge sticking. Working quickly, turn the cake out onto the sugared paper and carefully remove the lining paper.
12. Using a sharp knife, cut off the crusty edges from the two long sides. Roll the Swiss roll from one of the short ends, starting with a tight turn to make a good round shape and keeping the sugared paper inside the roll. Set on a wire rack and leave to cool.
13. To make the icing, put the icing sugar and cream cheese in a bowl and beat until smooth and creamy. Add the lemon juice and beat again.
14. When the cake is cold, gently unroll but do not flatten it or it could crack.
15. Spread the cake with then lemon butter icing, leaving a 1cm/½in border.
16. Spoon the lemon curd evenly over the icing.
17. Slowly roll the cake up again, enclosing the filling, and place on a plate. Sprinkle with extra sugar if you like.
18. Chill in the fridge to let the filling firm up somewhat.