Dear Rose-ites
I wanted to make a flourless chocolate roulade for Passover. I thought I would use the chocolate cloud in the Cake Bible. And I decided to make it as a roulade, which the recipe indicates is perfectly ok

I made the light whipped ganache as the filling and it came out superbly.

The only problem with the way the cake turned out was that when I tried to roll it into a roll with the filling the cake stuck to the parchment and left a thin skin of cake on the paper, leaving a patchy and slightly broken roll as I turned it.

So the details:
I didn’t use Baker’s Joy spray but buttered the parchment paper. I did moisten clean dish towels and lay it on the cake as it cooled. I wonder if the cake was slightly overbaked—it didn’t taste dry at all (but of course I had the whipped ganache on my tongue as well).

So: any thoughts on how to make this into an unbroken roll?

Thanks

Possibly line the pan with a silpat, or use shortening and cocoa powder.  I think you can do a search online for Alton Brown’s pan greasing mix, and use cocoa instead of flour (shortening, oil and cocoa).

I love the roulade you made, it is one of my favorite cakes.  I like to include the optional almonds (or hazelnuts) for texture and flavor. We also add a little cognac to the light whipped ganache.

Dear Julie
so there’s an idea. For passover, since it has to be flourless, instead of the grit of the flour, I use cocoa? What do you think the proportion to shortening should be? and did you also suggest adding oil to this mix too? how much of that?

I just googled Alton Brown’s mixture, he calls it “kitchen lube” and it makes a whole lot of sense. But the proportion is 2 cups shortening/ 1 1/2 cup flour. What is your sense of the conversion to cocoa powder?

Thank you!

I made a cocoa version of this, but it was a very small amount.  I probably used something like 2 Tablespoons shortening plus 1.5 Tablespoons cocoa powder.  Worked well for me for chocolate cakes. It is slower/more work to use than Baker’s Joy, but smells better. 

If you top the cake with powdered sugar or frost with dark ganache, any crust imperfections will be covered.  I forget if cornstarch falls within the restrictions of Passover, but if it does then it is easy enough to process sugar in the food processor until powdery enough to use as confectioner’s sugar.

Thank you Julie! As usual you are very helpful.