cocoa meringue roulade

cocoa meringue roulade

• 8 Jun 2026

I made a roulade to celebrate my friend's birthday but rather than my tried and true recipe, I used a different recipe because change is supposed to be a good thing. I turned to Natalie Paull's cocoa meringue roulade recipe because she's the goddess of baking. My usual recipe uses whole eggs whilst this roulade only uses egg whites, so really its a rolled pavlova by another name.

The roulade has a crunchy texture unlike my usual roulade and I took it my friend’s place interested to see how it compared to my old faithful recipe.

Here's the recipe for you which makes an 8 x 12 inch roulade. For all my recipes I use a 250ml cup and a 20-ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce your oven temperature by 20C

Cocoa meringue roulade - serves 4-6
Ingredients
120g egg whites (about 4)
pinch cream of tartar
200g caster sugar
35g dutch cocoa, plus extra to dust
5g vanilla essence or paste
pinch salt

For the filling
300g pure cream 
5g vanilla bean paste
1 punnet of your favourite berries (I used a mix of raspberries and strawberries)

Method

Preheat oven to 150˚C, fan forced or 170˚C, conventional. Line a 8 x 12 inch flat tray with canola spray and baking paper.

Using a stand mixer, place the egg whites and cream of tartar in the bowl, attach the whisk and put the stand mixer onto a medium-high speed. Whisk the whites until they reach firm peaks but are not chunky - they should still look creamy. (note: you can also use electric beaters or whisk by hand).

Add half of the sugar gradually, a scant tablespoon at a time to start with, then two at a time as the mix gets glossy and firm. Add the vanilla.

Stir the cocoa, salt and remaining sugar together and add all at once to the meringue (turn the machine off, add the cocoa mix, and wrap a teatowel around the mixer before turning the machine on again as the cocoa can go everywhere). Mix for 10 seconds then complete the mixing process with a spatula. Don't overmix or the meringue will get 'soupy'.

Scrape the meringue mix out onto the prepared tray and smooth out with an offset spatula leaving a centimetre or so margin, as the meringue will puff and spread when baking. Once spread, the meringue should be approximately one centimetre high. If using a tin with higher sides spread it all the way to the edge.

Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the top feels like a crunchy pillow. Cool the meringue completely (about 30 minutes). Check for residual warmth before adding the cream and assembling. The meringue can be prepared the day before filling.

Whip cream and vanilla to soft, supple peaks. Dust a sheet of clingwrap (slightly larger than the meringue) with cocoa powder. Flip the meringue onto the clingwrap, and carefully peel off the baking powder. Trim the sides of the meringue. The shorter side of the meringue should be facing you.

Spread the whipped cream over the meringue, leaving a 2.5 centimetre wide un-creamed strip along the top. Scatter the berries over the cream, making sure there is a good strip of berries along the bottom, because that will form the centre of the finished roulade.

Use the clingwrap to pull up the start of the roll, and tuck the meringue in along the length of the sheet, to get it started. Holding the clingwrap, roll it up using your fingers underneath to guide it. Use a repetitive lift and roll motion until you do a final full roll to reach the end of the meringue, with the seam underneath. To position the roulade onto a plate, roll the wrapped roulade so that the seam is at the top, flip it directly onto the plate, and unwrap the clingwrap. To serve, slice on a diagonal using a hot, serrated knife.

As I made this for a birthday, I don't have a cut slice to share with you but I can tell you that it was a big hit with the birthday girl and her twin daughters (who licked their plates clean!).

See you again next week with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian