Is there a lot of texture difference between the biscuit roulade sheets and the layers of a genoise? Since I am not having much success with the genoise and it is turning rubbery as well as losiong height, I am wondering if I bake layers of biscuit roulade and fill and frost it, would the taste and texture be similar? Can I skip the syrup in the roulade sheets if I have a moist filling? Can the roulade support 4 stacked layers of filling and frosting?

Sonali, the biscuit roulade is baked in a very thin layer, less than an inch, but it can be stacked several layers high.  The genoise (ideally) bakes up into a thicker layer, 1.75” or so. 

If you want biscuit in a layer cake form, use the biscuit de savoie.  It has a less tender texture and more open crumb than genoise.  And it does not have any butter flavor (the genoise does).

The same skills are used for both cakes, whipping eggs and folding.  The biscuit has you separate eggs and whip the yolks and whites separately, while the genoise whips whole eggs, but has you fold in butter, which is heavy and perhaps more difficult to fold successfully.  Personally, I find the genoise easier because you don’t have to mess with separate bowls for whites and yolks.

I have only tried to make genoise twice and it was not a success either time. Folding in the melted butter gives me a lot of trouble.

There is a recipe for genoise in Shirley Corriher’s “Bakewise” that gives you the option of using whipped heavy cream instead of melted butter. That would give you the extra richness of the butterfat while being easier to fold in, I suspect. It’s on my list of “things to try someday.” If you decide to try it, please let us know how it turns out.

Good luck!

Thanks for that interesting tip Barbara, I’m going to try it soon.