Close your eyes:
Imagine you are eating a giant, gooey powdered jelly doughnut…
Welcome to reality.
Looks fancy… but this jelly roll is ridiculously simple to make.
- It’s single-serving.
- Takes just 10 minutes
- It can even be fat-free.
I’ve always been intimidated by jelly roll cakes, but this recipe is one of the easiest things I’ve ever made. So even if you don’t think you can cook, you’ll probably have no trouble making this. And it’ll impress the socks off of everyone you know!
Skinny Mini Jelly Roll Cake
(Serves 1-2)
- 1/2 cup ww pastry flour, or white or spelt flour (70g) (For a gf version, use this: gluten-free option.)
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/8 tsp salt
- 100g water or other liquid (That’s 1/3 cup plus 1 T plus 1 tsp)
- 2 packets stevia (or omit and use 2 tbsp liquid sweetener–such as agave or honey–and decrease water by that amount)
- 2 tablespoons applesauce
- 1/4 tsp pure vanilla extract
Combine all dry ingredients together. In a separate bowl, combine wet (including applesauce). Mix wet into dry, but don’t overmix. Pour into a greased 8-in circle pan or a rectangular pan. (Be sure to grease it very well, or the cake won’t come out.) Cook for 10 minutes in a NON-preheated oven at 420F. (You might need to cook it longer, depending on your oven.) Let cool ten minutes before removing cake from pan. Then cut off all four edges so it forms a rectangle (if you used the circle pan). Spread on jam, or whatever else you wish, and roll it up. It’s that easy!
You can fill this single-serving cake with anything you can imagine: Peanut butter, chocolate chips, fresh berries, frosting, coconut butter, etc.
Shown above, with jam and Sugar-Free Powdered Sugar.
Question of the Day:
Do you consider yourself a good cook?
Or are you a walking disaster in the kitchen? Do you like to cook elaborate meals? Or are tv dinners and Chinese takeout your specialties?
P.S. I’m shocked so many of you voted for the non-chocolate recipe yesterday. What am I going to do with you guys?? 😉
I was planning to bake other things today, but after seeing this I think I have to change my plans. I’m trying this today!
This looks sooo good. I think I will try it tomorrow for breakfast. But just one question. I have never seen a recipe say “non preheated oven”. What does that mean exactly? Put it in the oven then turn it on? Does the ten min. bake time begin once it reaches 420? Sorry if that’s a dumb question. It just really confused me. Oh and I guess I have one more question, what size pan if using a rectangular pan? I’m sure the thickness will affect how well it rolls up.
Thanks Katie for having such an awesome blog with delicious, healthy recipes! It is my favorite place to drool and daydream about what to try next!!
Yes, put it in the oven and THEN turn the oven to 420 (as opposed to waiting until the oven says 420 to put it in). It’s not a dumb question at all!!
I would guess an 8×8? I used a circular pan, so I can’t say for sure.
Allrecipes.com has a cake pan size conversion article so perhaps the 8 x 4 loaf pan. I haven’t tried this yet so I’m hoping that the loaf pan won’t make it tooooo thick to roll easily. They convert by volume so perhaps it would. I’ll just have to try it and keep my fingers crossed. 🙂
These look so delicious. I’m making a few in the morning for breakfast! Thank you Katie!!
I’ve always been intimidated by the idea of jelly rolls, but you make it sound quite simple! I’ll have to try this soon. After all, I do consider myself quite a good cook; a cook who is always eager to jump at a challenge 😉
!! Genius. I love the idea of a lightened-up jelly roll. 🙂 And portion controlled, too!
I love cooking and am usually a good cook… I’ve had my goofs…. I am also a VERY messy cook!
I made this IMMEDIATELY when I got home last night with my aunt’s homemade Strawberry-Apple preserves. Talk about decadent! My favorite recipes are the “Single Girl” recipes. You don’t end up with a bunch of dessert just sitting around and you can easily double it for two people. Keep ’em coming, Katie!
I love Swiss rolls! My mum used to make them like this, fill the middle with jam and ice them with chocolate buttercream for a Yule log at Christmas and it was amazing – think I’m going to have to try that with one of these 🙂
I vowed to try this recipe the minute I saw it. Unfortunately I was at work at the time so I had to suffer through the entire work day before I could escape to my kitchen to test it out.
But mine cracked like crazy when I rolled it XP. I think a couple things could have caused it. 1.) I may have over-baked it, 2.) I let it rest for way more than 10 minutes, which I think might have let it get hard? And 3.), I used mostly (regular) whole wheat flour, and caramelized banana/coconut milk instead of oil. Do you think one of those is more likely to be the culprit than the others? I have rice flour I could sub in that might make a softer product if it’s the wheat that’s at fault.
Forgive me for replying to myself, but I found a cake-rolling tip that I thought someone else might find useful.
Apparently it helps a LOT in preventing cracks if you roll the cake straight out of the oven. Not necessarily filling the cake, but just rolling it a bit to “set” the shape. After that, letting it cool, filling and rolling it for real is much easier. I haven’t tried this yet, but I found it in reference to making a buche de noel without breaking the cake. (^.^)
thanks i will try that!
Love this recipe, so simple and so versatile.
You are also the reason I bought a food processor! Time to try out a couple more of your recipes this weekend
I just made it, Katie, and it came out of my pan easily without breaking; however, I didn’t even attempt to try to roll it up because it was crumbling at the edges and I was afraid I’d end up with a crumbled mess. I wonder what I did wrong? No one else had that problem. I followed the recipe exactly although I did strategically place some chocolate chips on top of the batter before baking and add a couple of drops of pink food coloring. I can’t imagine that would have made it crumbly, but what else could it be?
Anyway, I ended up just adding frosting to the cake and it looks beautiful even though it’s not rolled up. The frosting I made? I made your coconut butter. Then I added frozen strawberries and just a touch of coconut cream and a tiny bit (2 tbsp) of sugar. The strawberry coconut cream topping is amazing!! After I frosted the cake, I added more chocolate chips too the top. My sweetie is gonna love it!! (It’s his Valentine’s Day cake)
Thanks so much for sharing your recipes and pretty pictures! I always end up loving all the recipes I make that you share with us! 🙂
What floour did you use?
whole wheat pastry flour
Unfortunately, I’m not sure then 🙁
No, it couldn’t have been the chips, though, as I’ve made the recipe before with chocolate chips.
The only thing I can suggest is that maybe you can test your baking powder: http://bakingbites.com/2011/03/how-to-test-baking-powder-and-baking-soda-for-freshness/
Thanks so much for your suggestion! I just tested my baking powder and it was fine…lots of fizzing action going on. 🙂
Hi,
I had a similar issue and my flour is white flour and baking powder good as well. it rolls but the edges cracked so it became more of a 3 layer stack then a roll but very yummy! how did you get it to roll without that happening? or when i rolled it as whole it was fine til i cut it then it cracked.
PURE BRILLANCE! This so smart and cute Katie. Well done!
Just made this, filled it with a banana cheesecake filling I created just for it (banana+mor-inu+lemon juice+stevia+xanthan gum+vanilla) was a little impatient and tried rolling it up after only 7 minutes, needless to say it broke, though maybe its because I used ww flour instead of pastry? Oh well it was delicious! Going to make it again in the morning for my baby girls, using pineapple orange juice for the liquid, and filling it with coconut butter. Tropical shortcake rolls! Thanks for another amazing recipe Katie!
(oh my other plan is to add chocolate, use olive oil for the oil and use some left over filling from
Yeah, ww flour is much denser. But I’m so glad you liked it!! 🙂
Just made this, filled it with a banana cheesecake filling I created just for it (banana+mor-inu+lemon juice+stevia+xanthan gum+vanilla) was a little impatient and tried rolling it up after only 7 minutes, needless to say it broke, though maybe its because I used ww flour instead of pastry? Oh well it was delicious! Going to make it again in the morning for my baby girls, using pineapple orange juice for the liquid, and filling it with coconut butter. Tropical shortcake rolls! Thanks for another amazing recipe Katie!
(oh my other plan is to add baking coco, use olive oil for the oil and use some left over filling from Isa’s berry tarts from ppk.com…. YUM!)
I made two last nigh using white whole wheat flour and it broke but still tasted fabulous so I didn’t really care. On one of them (my husband’s favorite), I put peanut butter, chocolate chips, chopped strawberries, and walnuts. On another (my favorite), I just put Nutella and puhcahns. 🙂 They were both amazing and SO easy and I have the feeling I will probably be making them quite a bit!
Thanks so much for this one! It’s so open to change based on my mood and I love it!
I made this tonight and it was delicious! It didn’t exactly roll though, it broke instantly and was more of a jelly sandwich. But I used stevia, applesauce, and fruit-only jelly for a wonderful, healthy dessert! Thank you, as always!!