Roll Cake Gluten Free

Delight your guests with a gluten free Swiss roll cake. Follow this gf chocolate roll cake recipe to make a show-stopping dessert that tastes divine.

This giant gluten free Swiss roll cake recipeproves once and for all that it's not too hard to make a beautiful rolled dessert. Dress up any holiday table with this rich gluten free chocolate cake.

I first published a recipe for gluten free “ho-hos” in 2011. I had been blogging for just over 2 years (a blogging baby!) and I was ridiculously proud of myself for coming up with a copycat recipe for a

Cinnamon Roll Cake

Growing up, my brother and I were obsessed with Yodels. Well, he was way more obsessed than I was. I'll leave out the details of how I know that but it has something to do with saving the foil wrapper from his very first Yodel, but I'm not telling that story to protect the innocent. But when he asked me to bring over a dessert to help celebrate all of the fallbirthdays in our family (there are a ton of them!), a giant Swiss roll was basically a no-brainer.

As you read through this post, you'll notice that I refer to this delicious treat by several names: Swiss roll, chocolate roll, jelly roll… they all describe this distinct style of rolled cake, but you'll notice that one of these names is not quite like the others.

The beauty of this kind of gluten free cake is that you're free to use all kinds of yummy concoctions as filling.

Chocolate Swiss Roll Cake Dairy Free Egg Free Nut Free Vegan

When you make a chocolate sponge cake and fill it with a type of creme, we call it a Swiss roll cake. When you use vanilla or chocolate sponge cake and fill with jelly or jam, it's a jelly roll.

Here are some popular and interesting filling ideas that you can try sometime in the future, once you've mastered the art of the roll:

There are two primary reasons why this is the best gluten free Swiss roll cake recipe you're going to find: the light chocolate sponge cake and the heavenly cream filling.

Chocolate Swiss Roll (gluten & Dairy Free)

To achieve the best chocolate Swiss roll cake, you have to start with the right chocolate sponge cake. From the ingredients to the mixing technique to the baking, each step is important to ensure the right consistency for perfect fluffiness.

I made two versions of this lovely gluten free chocolate cake (more chocolate cakes!) to bring to my brother's house. I think the crowd was kind of split down the middle for favorites. One version was filled with marshmallow creme (the homemade kind has my heart), and the other was filled with no bake cheesecake filling.

In Gluten Free Classic Snacks, the Little Debbie Swiss Rolls are filled with a 7-Minute Creme Filling. That filling is extremely similar to marshmallow creme, as it's made withegg whites, sugar, and water.

Gluten Free Raspberry & Lemon Swiss Roll Recipe

To make 7 Minute Creme Filling, rather than cooking the sugar to 240°F on its own and then whipping it with the egg whites while it's still hot, everything is mixed together and then cooked over a double boiler until it reaches 160°F. Then the mixture is beaten for 7 minutes until light and fluffy.

If you don't follow my instructions for how to mix up your chocolate cake batter, you may end up with a sponge that isn't very sponge-like.

Be sure to mix the ingredients as long as necessary when it calls for it, and resist the urge to over mix when I call for gentle folding. Follow these instructions, and your cake will come out light, fluffy, moist, and delicious.

Gluten Free Lemon Swiss Roll Recipe

As important as the mixing is the baking. For this particular gluten free cake recipe it's much better to pull your sponge from the oven a minute too early rather than a minute too late.

Overbaking your cake will rob it of the much-needed moisture necessary for a successful roll — and that's when the cracking and breaking happens.

You may be tempted to roll your chocolate cake as tightly as possible, maybe because you like the idea of multiple spirals or perhaps because you think it will hold better when coiled.

Gluten Free Chocolate Yule Log Recipe

Please resist that urge, because rolling your cake too tightly will only lead to disaster. For starters, you may crack or break the cake from the excessive pulling.

Assuming your sponge cake stays intact, you're going to squeeze out all the filling if you apply too much pressure to the layers.

This general rolled cake technique isn't new to us here. We've made a Pumpkin Cake Roll and a Yule Log, but this is the first time you're watching me make it in a video, step by step. Sometimes, a bunch of still photos are enough.

Vegan Gluten Free Ho Hos

But other times, and I think this is one of those times, you need to see it frame by painstaking frame—especially when the whole video is still super short.

This is the very same technique you'll use for any rolled cake. Bake the cake until it's just done (don't overbake or your cake will crack!), roll it right out of the oven with a flat weave (tea) kitchen towel, and allow it to cool as coiled. The cake develops a “memory” for rolling.

To avoid cracking and breaking, you should roll your chocolate sponge cake starting from the shorter end. Rolling in this direction also allows you the space for plenty of filling, without the need to roll tightly for more layers.

Featured Recipe: Mini Gluten Free Swiss Roll Cakes

If you end up with extra gf cake, you can store it tightly covered on your kitchen counter for up to 3 days. I don't like to keep it in the fridge as I've found that it accelerates the drying process, and dry cake is no fun.

I don't recommend freezing a gluten free jelly roll cake as the consistency of the sponge and the filling may change too much.

As always, unless I specifically state otherwise, I haven't tried this recipe with any of the following substitutions. They're just my educated guesses!

Gluten Free Swiss Roll

I think that Earth Balance buttery sticks would work quite well as a butter substitute in this recipe. Or you could always try my favorite vegan butter from Miyoko's Kitchen or Melt brands.

Earth Balance is so salty, though, I'd leave out the salt in the dry ingredients if you use it. Just make sure the chocolate you use for the glaze is dairy-free, and you should be all set.

My standard “chia egg” substitution recommendation just won't work when we're talking about 4 eggs. The egg whites could maybe be replaced with aquafaba, but the egg yolks can't.

Gluten Free Strawberry Cake Roll

This is usually the case for both prepackaged snack cakes and the homemade kind you may find at a grocery store bakery.

No, Little Debbie snack cakes — Swiss roll or otherwise — are not gluten free. The brand doesn't have any gluten free line, and it hasn't indicated that one is in the works.

While I use both all purpose gluten free flour and corn starch in this gf Swiss roll recipe, I don't use them in the same proportions as my gluten free cake flour recipe.

Gluten Free Carrot Cake Roll

Either a Swiss roll tin or a jelly roll pan will work for this gluten free sponge cake roll recipe. These pans resemble baking or cookies sheets but have a taller lip (usually an inch tall) for cakes.

If your cake breaks while rolling, it's likely that you overbaked it, used a smaller pan so your cake is too thick, or you didn't roll it while it was still warm, so it had already “set”. The cake is still very much edible, but it's not quite suited for what we're trying to achieve here.

Never fear: You don't have to throw away cracked and broken cake. Instead, use it to make cake pops, or top it with frosting for a light and fluffy treat.

Vegan Gluten Free Pumpkin Roll

Depending on the extent of the cracking, you may still be able to use the cake to make a Swiss log cake. Just assemble the cake, and then cover the imperfections with a thick chocolate ganache. No one will ever know!

Yes, you can use this chocolate Swiss roll cake recipe to make mini gluten free Swiss rolls. Just follow the instructions through baking, and when you pull the sponge from the oven, quickly slice it into smaller pieces. From there, continue with the instructions for rolling, filling, and topping.

Originally published on the blog in 2011 (!); new photos and video added in 2017; text resources added in 2022. Recipe as written adapted from Little Debbie-Style Swiss Rolls on page 119 of Gluten Free Classic Snacks: 100 Recipes for the Brand-Name Treats You Love.Don't be scared of the deco cake pattern on this gluten free strawberry cake roll! I promise it's really so easy to make. And anyway if you're not into the pattern or just don't have time for it or just don't really like your mother

Gluten Free 4th Of July Dessert (angel Food Cake Roll)

Much (no judgment here!), you can just make this vanilla sponge cake roll filled with whipped cream and strawberries … without the pattern.

Just leave it out! How easy is that? Even easier than making the pattern itself, which is pret-ty easy already. That's