Niño Envuelto – Jessica Dee

The niño envuelto is a Mexican dessert that is basically like a jelly roll or a Swiss roll. Nino envuelto means “wrapped child” in Spanish, meaning that the cake wraps around a filling. You can use jam, preserves or cream fillings. You can make the cake chocolate, strawberry or vanilla. I made mine with a pineapple preserves and cream filling and generously covered the entire roll with coconut. Just talking about it makes me want to make another one.

The jelly roll has a particular technique. Rolling the cake and unrolling it takes finesse and patience. You want to get that swirl just right.

The Mexican Jelly roll. Also commonly known as a Swiss roll. It is a sponge cake that is typically filled with a fruit filling and/or cream. It can be topped with confectioner sugar, coconut flakes or whipped cream.

• 6 eggs
• 200 g granulated sugar 1 Cup leveled
• 200 g all purpose flour 1 1/2 Cups leveled
• 1 TBS baking powder
• 1 TBS vanilla extract
• 1 cup jam/preserve of choice

• 1 cup heavy whipping cream
• honey to sweeten whipping cream

• unsweetened coconut for topping

• Line the baking sheet with parchment paper. Try to make it fit to the pan. Lightly oil the parchment paper and the sides of the baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 400F. In a medium bowl, add flour and baking powder and mix together with wisk. Set aside. Place all of the eggs and sugar in a mixing bowl. Using whipping attachment, mix ingredients on medium-high for 5 minutes. Bring speed to low and add vanilla. Mix until just combined. Remove bowl from mixer stand. Add flour mixture to egg mixture a little at a time. Gently folding in with spatula until all flour is incorporated. Pour batter onto the parchment lined baking sheet. Spread to all corners of sheet. Try to make it as even as possible. Bake for 7 minutes. Remove and let cool down, but not completely. It needs to be warm and flexible to work with. Place a large piece of parchment paper on working area. Sprinkle granulated sugar on top of cake. Carefully flip cake over on top of the parchment paper. Remove pan and carefully pull parchment paper off of cake. Starting at the bottom, use parchment paper to roll cake. Gently roll cake until you reach the end. Lay the roll seam side down, let sit for 3 minutes. Carefully unroll cake. Spread a thin layer of whipped cream over entire cake. Then, spread the preserves. Make sure it’s not too thick, otherwise it will push the filling out at the end. Starting at the bottom, carefully roll cake until you reach the end, seam side down again. Wrap roll with parchment paper and let cool in fridge for 1-2 hours so it can set. Next, spread more preserves on the top and sides of roll with a pastry brush. Generously add unsweetened coconut. Cut into thick slices. Enjoy!

When adding flour to egg mixture, make sure to incorporate all of the flour. If you bake cake with unmixed flour, it will leave hard patches of flour on the cake.  Do not let the cake cool completely, it needs to be warm and flexible to roll. If it’s too cold it could crack when you roll.  Before you flip cake onto parchment paper, go around the edges with a knife to make sure the cake isn’t stuck to the pan.  Spread thin layers of cream and preserves. If it is too thick, a lot of it will be pushed out once you reach the end. It will make a mess.  You don’t have to use whipped cream, you can just use jam/preserves in the center.      

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