Making a Roulade or Swiss Roll is very easy. I have a quiet obsession with cakes based on fruit. This is no ordinary roulade – butter is replaced with apricot puree, and the roulade is filled with apricot jam and vanilla cream. The beauty is it only takes 10 minutes to bake and is mixed all in one food processor bowl. What is there not to like?

On a more serious note, apart from trying to be healthier, it is a terrific way of using abundant seasonal produce. Here, you use the apricots as a puree in the apricot roulade and the homemade jam.

How to Roll your Apricot Roulade

Apricot Roulade or Apricot Swiss Roll is simple to make; whisk the eggs and sugar until light and frothy as you dare. The tricky step is rolling the cake. The secret is to roll the cake as soon as it comes out of the oven. Use baking paper or a tea towel doused in powdered sugar. The tea towel works well, provided you use plenty of sugar. But, as it cools, it gives off moisture and inevitably removes a thin outer layer of the cake as you unroll it. However, the cake is very smooth. My preference is baking paper. Dust with powdered sugar and then roll carefully – don’t let the paper pucker, and it will be perfect. Some recipes recommend spreading the jam immediately onto the warm cake and then rolling. I have yet to try this, so I can’t recommend it.

The filling options are endless – I have chosen vanilla cream with my apricot and cinnamon jam. Delicious. I have yet to try it, but there is no reason why the apricots can’t be replaced with peaches or nectarines and, later in the year, with persimmon or pumpkin puree.

Click here for more apricot recipes, or go to the baking section.