Roll With It

Gumdrop,

Having seen the non-edible fruits of your Halloween labour, you are entirely forgiven for your tardy post. Mom duties and Gourmet grief must be honoured. I have to admit that I was always more of a supermarket checkout reader of Gourmet. Its stunning covers were a handy calming device when a 600-item customer was a head of me in the 10 items or less lane.

While waiting for your post, I’ve been contemplating the next challenge, bemused by the options available to me. Should we humour your inner-hippie and bake some ancient grains bread? Maybe it was time to return to pastry and bake rustic apple tarts?

But then two things happened: First, my mom came over for dinner and brought an old stand-by: a strawberry jellyroll. It was a bold move on her part because dear old mom has had a terrible run rolling those darn sponges. The last few attempts have been dry and cracked, like feet in summer after a few missed pedicures. This time, she managed a moist cake, but it still had a lot of cracks. I was disappointed to learn that she used store-bought jam, not my aunt’s homemade jam filled with plump berries. Then again, this is a woman who, as a schoolgirl, traded her homemade cake for store-bought cookies.

The second thing that happened was I came across this drool inducing article during my daily epicurious visit and I’ve been obsessed with the idea of brown sugar buttercream ever since.

So while it’s too early to challenge you to a bûche de noël, I hereby issue the next challenge as a brown sugar buttercream roulade. The degree of garnish fussiness is entirely up to you!

Enjoy,
Px