Easy and quick Valentine’s Day heart cake without a mold, truly delicious with a red velvet sponge base prepared with a few simple ingredients, soft and melt-in-your-mouth, without fats and without yeast. I decided to soak it a little to fragrance the base, but it’s not even necessary; I chose an alchermes soak. For the filling, a quick cream with sheep ricotta and whipped cream, and for decoration, which are not just decorative but add so much taste and aroma, fresh strawberries. I must confess that for the first of the season, I found them truly delicious, sweet, and flavorful. I decided to prepare this dessert for Valentine’s Day, as February 14th, the holiday for all lovers, is getting closer, but it’s so easy and good that it can be made on many other occasions, even as a birthday cake. It can be prepared red, or without coloring, in the shape of a heart, or even a simple circle or number, using a suitable template. I created a heart by drawing it on an A4 sheet, folding it in half, and cutting it with scissors. I placed the sheet on the base and cut it with a knife. Easy, right? So, let’s prepare it together.
- Difficulty: Easy
- Cost: Economical
- Preparation time: 4 Minutes
- Portions: 6
- Cooking methods: Oven
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Mother's Day, Valentine's Day
Ingredients for heart cake without a mold
- 4 medium eggs
- 4 oz sugar
- 2.8 oz all-purpose flour
- 0.7 oz potato starch
- 1 tsp wildflower honey
- as needed vanilla
- 0.2 oz red powder food coloring
- 1 tsp unsweetened cocoa
- 2.8 oz water
- 0.7 oz alchermes
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 10.6 oz whipping cream
- 10.6 oz sheep ricotta
- 1.8 oz sugar
- 0.3 oz gelatin sheets
- 1.4 oz milk
- 7.1 oz strawberries
- 1 tsp baking soda
- as needed spray gel for desserts
Tools to prepare heart cake without a mold
- 1 Bowl
- 1 Electric whisk
- 1 Spatula
- 1 Sieve
- 2 Small bowls
- 1 Fork
- 1 Piping bag
- 1 Star nozzle
- 1 Plain nozzle
- 1 Knife
- 1 Cutting board
Steps to prepare heart cake without a mold
Let’s start preparing the sponge cake. With all ingredients measured and a 12″x16″ pan lined with parchment paper ready, preheat the oven to 356°F in static mode. Leave the rack in the center.
In a large bowl, start working 4 medium eggs at room temperature. Add sugar and work for about 5 minutes at the highest speed with an electric whisk until you get a fluffy and frothy mixture. Add honey and vanilla, work again with the whisk, then set aside.
Add the sifted flour with starch little by little and incorporate it with a spatula with gentle movements from bottom to top, continue until complete and add the coloring and cocoa in the same way. Pour onto a 12″x16″ pan lined with parchment paper, distributing the mixture evenly. Bake for 12 minutes at 356°F in a hot static oven.
Remove the cooked sponge from the oven, cover with a sheet of parchment paper, and let cool.
In a bowl, put water, sugar, and alchermes, bring to a boil, in a saucepan or as I did for a few seconds in the microwave at full power. Let cool.
Soak the gelatin sheets in cold water.
In a large bowl, whip the well-chilled cream from the fridge with the electric whisk. In a smaller one, work the well-drained ricotta with sugar, we can add a little vanilla to perfume the cream. Add the whipped cream to the cream little by little.
Squeeze the gelatin sheets, put them in a small bowl with milk, dissolve in the microwave, or in a saucepan. Let cool a bit then add a little of the ricotta and cream mixture and mix, then add it to the rest of the cream and mix well.
On an A4 sheet, draw a heart, fold the sheet in half where it divides the heart in half, and cut with scissors. The heart is of medium size so that two can be easily obtained from the sponge cake. Place the sheet on the sponge cake and cut with a sharp knife.
Place a heart on a tray, lightly wet it with the soak and fill the base with the cream, using a piping bag with a 1 cm plain nozzle. Cover with the second heart. Wet a little more and fill with the cream using a star nozzle.
Wash the strawberries with water and baking soda, rinse and dry them. Leave one whole to place in the center of the heart on the cream, then slice some into thin slices, removing the stem. Start decorating the cake by placing the slices to create a decoration on the heart’s perimeter. I added 2 small hearts of sponge cake cut with a cookie cutter. You can also decorate according to your taste.
Let it rest in the fridge for a couple of hours before enjoying.
