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Decorated Jelly Rolls
Jelly rolls to serve whole on a set table may be covered with water icing or pearl glaze not beaten, either white or pink, and then ornamented with white egg-icing in wreath or vine and leaf patterns down the whole length; or lines, or bands may be run down, and between the lines of icing run lines of currant jelly; or, place sugar flowers, crystallized fruits or small ornamental candies. Another way is to moisten the outside with water icing thinly spread with a knife and then roll in pink sugar-sand or granite sugar, which is of a larger grain.
This is a finishing procedure rather than a formula: the roll is assumed to be baked and filled already, and what follows is bakery display work. The terms are all trade vocabulary from the period.
- The roll must be cold and dryAny warmth in the sponge will thin the icing and make currant jelly bleed into it. Chill the finished roll, trim the ends square, and brush away loose crumbs before glazing.
- Water icingConfectioners' sugar thinned with water to a spreadable glaze — roughly 1 cup sugar to 1 to 1 1/2 tablespoons water, sometimes with a few drops of lemon. It sets to a thin matte shell, not a hard one.
- Pearl glaze, not beatenA sugar glaze of the fondant type, worked warm. "Not beaten" appears to be the point: beating aerates the glaze and turns it opaque, where unbeaten it stays smoother and more translucent.
- Egg-icingThis is royal icing — egg white whipped with confectioners' sugar until it holds a piped line. Modern kitchens should use pasteurized whites or meringue powder, since it dries rather than cooks.
- PinkPeriod pink came from cochineal or carmine. Any gel food colour does the job; add it sparingly, as the colour of an icing can shift as it dries.
- Sugar-sand and granite sugarSanding sugar and the coarser pearl or nib sugar, both still sold. Roll the moistened cake in it immediately, while the thin icing is still tacky, and press gently rather than rubbing.
- Currant jelly linesWarm the jelly slightly and strain it so it pipes in a clean bead. Applied cold and stiff it tears the icing; applied hot it runs.
- ServingSlice with a long serrated knife, wiping it between cuts, or the icing cracks and drags the jelly into the sponge.
The American Pastry Cook belongs to the era of hotel and restaurant pastry departments, when a dessert might be expected to reach the table as a display piece — hence "jelly rolls to serve whole on a set table." The rolled sponge is close kin to the cake generally called a Swiss roll in Britain; American books settled on "jelly roll" for the version filled with fruit preserve. Currant jelly was one of the standard bright, firm, clear-setting jellies of the period. The whole passage is less a recipe than a menu of finishes, which is how trade manuals of the time often taught garnish — give the workman the vocabulary and let him combine it.