Cake #7 Sponge Roll

After a craptastic night with Evie, who was up at 3am and did not go back down until 4:30, after Ted drove her around Bel Air, I continued the vibe and made a craptastic cake. Let me first start off by saying that I have never made a Sponge Roll before. I have made Sponge cakes, sure, but not a roll. I have made tons of home-made bread, but never a Sponge Roll.

Maybe I was just delirious from a lack of sleep, but my first attempt at this cake this morning was, as my students would say, "an epic-fail". Just take a look at the picture below and you can understand why. It looks like some zombie BRAAAaains.

In the middle of mixing the cake batter, making breakfast for Ted and myself, making breakfast for Evie and feeding Evie, and giving the dog treats so he didn't feel left out, I missed an ingredient. The sugar. Ever try to make a cake without sugar? Just don't. Not only does it taste like you are eating a spongy loaf of butter, it falls apart into clumps, as the picture perfectly portrays (some alliteration for my English teachers out there). Then, came the rolling, did you know a cake won't "roll" if it doesn't have sugar to bind all that buttery dough together? Now you do. Besides the freakin' sugar, this cake called for butter, flour, baking powder, vanilla, eggs, milk, and raspberry jelly.

Here is the book's picture:

This is the first cake that I had to make twice, and I am pretty miffed about it. I wanted to go through all 100 cakes without any big screw-ups. Anyway, round two went much better. For starters, I added the sugar, secondly, by the time my husband got home from an appointment he had brought back an early Valentine's day present- some flowers. He said that he knew we had a bad night and that my morning wasn't looking too hot either, so he thought this would cheer me up. Ted may have the biggest ego out of anyone I know, (just get him to walk by a mirror without checking himself out and making eyes at himself) but he always manages to find room in there for me. Definitely a sweet guy. So, with my new flowers on the table and a new, improved sponge cake out of the oven, and a daughter FINALLY in a nap, today is looking up.

Ted, not a fan of raspberry jelly still ate a piece of my cake, he loved it, but still thinks that it would have been better if I did strawberry jelly instead. I love raspberries so of course, I had no problems with it.


Here is my cake, and my attempt to make my plate look nice (ha):

Next week we are making a Date and Spice Loaf, which I am looking forward to because I love the taste of whole-wheat flour, and this is the first "cake" that has called for it.

Until next post, don't forget to add sweetness to your life!