Ice Cream Cake Roll!

So many adventures! This weekend we politely declined the forest preserves' invitations to bike in them because they refused to air condition themselves, so since we didn't get to get soaked biking, I decided we should have an adventure of a different sort.

Making a cake roll was something I'd been wanting to try for a while, and it was easier than I expected. Also messy. But messy food is always more delicious.

You start by making the recipe for the Hershey's Holiday Chocolate Cake (do not use another recipe; we have already verified this is by far the best!): 1.75 c flour, 0.75 c cocoa, 2 tsp baking soda, 1 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp salt, 0.25 c vegetable oil, 0.2 c unsweetened applesauce, 2 c sugar (sorry), 2 egg whites, 2 tsp real vanilla, 1 c buttermilk or sour milk (1 tbsp vinegar than milk to 1 cup), and 1 cup black coffee (we use Cuban espresso :)). Bake it for 15-20 minutes at 350 in a jelly roll pan. Don't forget to line the pan in greased wax paper so you don't have to do major archeology to get it out like I did....

When it's done, turn it out on an old but clean kitchen towel. Roll it up.

Dye your ice cream crazy colors, stirring well to make sure it's soft enough to spread. (I know a guy who loves stirring, if you need help.) Unroll the cake, spread the ice cream, and take pictures if you want bragging rights of the messiest cake. Sadly, things were very, very melty and we only had time for three colors. Who knew that ice cream takes so much food coloring!?

Then the hard part: roll it up. (Well it's only hard if you care about it looking nice, which we didn't, because, again, the messier, the more delicious!) We had to chill it in the freezer for 20-30 minutes so the ice cream didn't try to escape when we began rolling. Eventually, we sort of conquered it.

Chill (if you can wait), slice, and serve! Hopefully your cake came out of the pan in one piece, wasn't as broken as ours, and was therefore an actual spiral.

Be forewarned that this is an extremely rich dessert, so don't feel bad about giving up eating it and having to send it all to me! :)

P.S. Here's why you should use an old towel. It's easy to eat the cake off it, but the food coloring is another story. Sorry, Mom!