Lucky for us, the debut of Baking Chez Moi happened close to the holiday season, which provided the perfect excuse to choose Gingerbread Buche de Noel as one of our first recipes from the new book. This roulade involves several components, but is relatively easy to put together in stages. I followed the recipe to the letter and ended up with a dessert that had a huge wow factor, both with its appearance and with its flavor. The lightly spiced cake is filled with an essentially unsweetened cinnamon cream cheese filling, then coated with billows of marshmallowy meringue. Chunks of candied pecan finish the cake off, giving it a rustic appearance. Such a great collection of contrasts and flavors: the spiced cake, the tangy cream cheese, the sweet meringue, the crunchy candied nuts.
The only issue I had with this cake was not getting quite the amount of volume I wanted from the egg whites as I was whipping them. I think the problem involved using the stand mixer; its whisk just doesn't get quite deep enough into the bowl to generate volume for a small amount of egg whites. (Actually, I will confess that there were two issues with this cake, but the second one involved securing a serving plate for it, an endeavor that required stops at three stores. On the other hand, I now have a perfect dish for presenting and serving a roulade.)
All in all, though, I really love everything about this cake: It's a project but so worthwhile to undertake.
