Bolu Gulung

If I had to choose only one cake of mom’s kitchen, I would probably choose her bolu gulung aka rolled cake. Just like many other Indonesian cakes, they use a lot of egg yolks to get that soft texture. I had always enjoyed being in the kitchen when mom baked her cakes. And once she transferred the cake from its tin, I liked to nimble on the thin layer of skin left in the tin. I find it both satisfying to peel it off and tasted just as good ?

I haven’t tried on any new recipes these past months even though my to-try list keeps growing. Last weekend I tried on mom’s recipe of bolu gulung, however I only experimented with half recipe. Firstly, I don’t have the rolled cake tin and secondly the most important reason was it frightens me to try whole recipe and wasted so many eggs if it failed.

Not sure where she got this recipe from but as far as I remember, she has made this since we were kids. Here is the full recipe for 30 cm x 30 cm cake tin:

• 2 whole eggs
• 10 egg yolks (a lot, right?)
• 120 grams castor sugar
• 50 grams all-purpose flour
• 125 grams melted butter
• vanilla extract
• Your favorite jam for filling, or can be substituted with buttercream

Preheat oven at 200C, line the cake tin with baking paper and set aside.

On a mixing bowl, beat the eggs while adding sugar a little at times until it is pale and fluffy.

Then add in melted butter and vanilla extract, keep beating on low to incorporate everything. Make sure no melted butter is sitting on the bottom of the mixing bowl.

Lastly, carefully fold in the sifted all purpose flour to the egg mixture until well combined.

Pour the cake batter to cake tin and gently tap the tin to kitchen bench to release any trapped air.

Bake the cake for about 12 – 15 minutes, keep an eye on the cake while baking. The top of my cake was not brown enough after the 15 minutes baking time even though it has been fully cooked. So, I put it on broil mode for another 2 – 3 minutes until it turned light brown.

Once it is done baking, gently flip the cake to another sheet of baking paper and roll. I left mine rolled until it cooled to room temperature before unrolled it and spread with generous black cherry jam. Then the cake should be easily rolled back and tied both end of baking paper to help hold the cake shape.

It is best to cool the cake in the refrigerator for at least an hour before serving.

Some helpful tips:

• To prevent the skin of the cake stick to baking paper when it is rolled, some says to sprinkle little bit of icing sugar on the baking paper.
• Do not over bake the cake as it will crack and not have the flexibility to roll.
• For buttercream filling, make sure the cake is cooled to room temperature. For jam, usually it will not matter if the cake is still slightly warm.

So as you can tell my cake was far from perfect in appearance but tasted almost like mom’s! It has definitely earned hubby’s approval ? But indeed as most people would agree, practice makes better, right?