Jane's comfort food: Jelly Roll

You've heard about it in countless songs, now make it!

I used to make this in high school and recently it's become a favorite again because it soothes me - and because it uses a lot of eggs, which I have in ultra-abundance due to my devoted chickens. The recipe is adapted from ye olde Joy of Cooking.

Jelly Roll
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 10 x 15 jelly roll pan (you usually use it for cookies) or put a sheet of wax paper in the pan and butter the wax paper, that's what I do.

5 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 ts vanilla
7/8 cup of cake flour (if using plain flour, just 3/4 cup)
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
about 2/3 cup raspberry preserves or whatever jam you have
about 1 cup flaked coconut

Separate the eggs. Beat the egg yolks and sugar until light, add vanilla, salt, and baking powder and beat some more.

In a separate bowl beat the egg whites until glossy and stiff.

Fold in 1/3 of the beaten egg whites and the flour. Then fold in the rest of the egg white mixture. Spread evenly in the jelly-roll pan (not so easy).

Bake for about ten minutes - watch it carefully, it can burn. If you used wax paper, flip the cake over onto a clean towel and peel the wax paper off. If you just buttered the pan, you may have to jiggle a spatula under it carefully to get the cake out.

Cut off the edges of the cake with scissors. Spread most of your jam on the still-warm cake, and sprinkle coconut to taste over the jam. Roll the cake (starting from a short end) and put it on a plate seam-side down.

Spread remaining jam over the cake and sprinkle remaining coconut over the jam.

This is MUCH better the next day! But sadly there is usually hardly any left to prove it!

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