A Roulade for the 'We Should Cocoa' Challenge for May

Hazelnut Meringue Roulade with Chocolate Olive Oil Mousse Filling

My first thought on seeing the May challenge for 'We Should Cocoa',  set by Chele at Chocolate Teapot, was "No way!". Instead of asking us to bake with a specific ingredient, Chele wanted us to make a specific chocolate product - a roulade! I can't remember the last time I made a swiss roll, and I don't think I've ever made the more modern sounding roulade!

However, the point of joining in with a 'challenge' is to be challenged at times - it would hardly do to drop out this month because it was too difficult! Another challenge ahead for me is hosting a lunch for friends, including one guest who is both gluten- and dairy-free. It's always difficult to provide a dessert which she can eat alongside everyone else, particularly as she doesn't like acidic fresh fruit either. This seemed a chance to kill two birds with one stone - create a roulade which was dairy and gluten free.

Meringue fitted the criteria of being gluten free, but the filling was a little more problematic, especially if I wanted it to be a chocolate one - most recipes use ganache, or include dairy products such as butter or milk. As I'm getting used to using olive oil, instead of butter, in a lot of my baking, I decided to see if there were any recipes around to make chocolate mousse with olive oil. Of course there were!

I eventually decided to use Delia Smith's recipe for a Hazelnut Meringue Roulade, and fill it with chocolate olive oil moussse, made using this recipe.  As I was using hazelnuts in the meringue, but didn't have the hazelnut liqueur specified in the recipe, I replaced three tablespoons of the extra-virgin olive oil with hazelnut oil.

The recipe for the roulade was fairly straightforward to follow, but I was a little alarmed to see how the meringue puffed up and buckled as it cooked, although this could have been because I used the fan oven. The meringue seemd to settle down as it cooled, although it was a little flaky on the surface.

The chocolate mouse was easy to make too, with none of the danger of seizing that you get when making a traditional mousse with just chocolate, eggs and butter (see footnote). The only difficulty was deciding when to add it to the roulade - too set and it would be difficult to spread, while using it too soon might mean it just oozed everywhere. In the event, I think I should have waited a little longer - it was still a little too runny.

Fortunately, I managed to roll up the meringue without cracking it too much! Most of the cracks you can see are just on the surface, and don't go deep into the meringue.The hardest part was over!

I decorated the top of the roulade with drizzles of melted chocolate and chopped toasted hazelnuts. I only used half the quantity of mousse for the filling, so the rest was spooned into small glasses and decorated with more chopped toasted hazelnuts.

The chocolate mousse was surprisingly rich tasting, but lighter than a mousse made with butter. It blended well with the meringue, which was still chewy inside, to produce a rich dessert, which didn't seem too sweet, despite the large quantity of sugar in both the meringue and mousse.

Although I'm pleased that I have tackled something which I've avoided up to now, I found the rolling stage of the roulade a bit too nerve wracking, so I'm going to chicken out of it and produce a layered meringue and mousse dessert for my guests next week. Although the process worked this time, it seems the sort of thing which you can't guarantee to work every time, and I can't afford a failure in front of others.

Note (added 15th May) - when I made the Chocolate Mousse the second time, the chocolate/oil mixture was a still little too hot when I added it to the egg yolks and sugar, so that it started to seize. I remedied this by quickly beating in a couple of tablespoons of the whisked egg white, before folding in the remainder, but I'm adding this as a note to remember - cool the chocolate a little, if necessary, before adding to the egg yolks.