Love from little monster to little monster.

(In Portuguese)




At the end of 2009/ beginning of 2010 was when I goy the hang of baking cookies.

I'm that kind of person who might be mistaken many times, but at least makes mistakes paying attention, so I remember them and try to avoid them each time I prepare a recipe again.
After a while (which might be long or short) I learn the right way.
Well, it happens that my brother only saw the cookies when I more often baking nicely, and I remember him being impressed.
It made me so glad, that whenever possible (when my mother comes to visit me) I bake something to send him.
Then I started thinking about his birthday cake, which I wanted to be pretty and full of love.
My doubts went away when I saw a heart cake at happythings.tumblr.com (unfortunately, I didn't find that exact link anymore.

I soon googled it, since I wouldn't rest until I found out how could that be made.

That was it. I didn't use the same recipes, but I used the same technique, and have put my confectioner self to work!

Even with some accidents on the way, I liked the results. :)

Heart cake - orange and carrot, with orange jam frosting

(I don't like the flavor of the coloring, so I'd rather use carrot for that).

I started with the batter that would make the heart, carrot cake.

I invented that beets would be nice to achieve a more vivid color - oh, what an error!

1 1/2 washed and peeled carrot (instead, I used one carrot and half beetroot)

3 eggs

2/3 cup whole yogurt

2 cups granulated sugar

1 cup (200g) softened unsalted butter

3 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder

I'll warn right away that this was too much cake. I could have baked half of this recipe and still have a little leftover. I baked it in two loaf pans, in the regular oven.
This isn't the recipe I usually use for carrot cake, but the smartie here forgot to bring the recipe written down, so I had to improvise.


Anyway. I processed the vegetables in the blender with the yogurt and eggs.
I beat the butter and sugar together then added the sifted flour, alternating with the blender mixture.
At the end I've added the salt and baking powder, stirring delicately.
I greased the pans, and this was what the batter looked like before baking:

I baked for 50 minutes at 180ºC.
When I took it out of the oven, things changed.
Apparently, beetroots loose color when they pass through intense heat.
The cake tasted good and was fluffy, but the color had gone away. Besides, the crust was pink and the inside was orange. Go figure...

No matter if the color went right or wrong, this was the time to crumble the cake using a fork.
Lucky me I didn't crumble both of the cakes, because I didn't need both.
Soon I'll explain how to put the cake together, meanwhile what's important is to say that these crumbs will be mixed with some of the frosting to form the heart inside the cake.
My solution to the color problem without using food coloring was to squeeze the juice of half a beet. I swear the taste wasn't altered, since the beet flavor is too mild.
I did it grating the beet finely, and then straining through a clean cloth.
I mixed this beet juice with the jam that I used as frosting and set aside.

Now it's time to bake the main cake, which I made orange flavored.
I needed two round small pans (15 or 20cm diameter), and what I found to substitute with was ramequins. 
To make sure the cake wouldn't stick to the pan (considering I had never used a porcelain pan for cakes before), I greased it, then covered with parchment paper, then greased again.
I've cut paper squares equivalent to the pans diameter and arranged them inside the pans but making creases. In the picture below it's easier to understand.

Carrot cake

3 oranges

3/4 cups oil (corn, canola, sunflower, or any one that's handy really)

3 eggs

3 cups flour

2 cups sugar

3 teaspoons baking powder

butter to grease the pans

I processed in the blender the oranges (peeled, seeded, and chopped), the oil and eggs. 
Next I mixed it with the sifted flour and the sugar, leaving the baking powder to the end.
I divided the batter in the prepared pans and baked at 180ºC in the electric oven.
It took forever to bake, I'm not sure why.
When it had been baking for one hour, I decided to raise the temperature a bit.
What a bad idea! It made the cakes top crack. I switched back to 180ºC.
The cakes stayed there for another 20 minutes, then I decided to take them out.
Let them cool for 10 minutes inside their pans, over cooling racks, then 20 minutes out of them, inside the paper.

After that, I cut off the tops with a large sharp knife, so that they would be regular and flat.
I figured they came out really heavy.
I imagine that has something to do with the porcelain pan, because all the other times I prepared this recipe it came out soft.

Well, I improvised a compass with a string and two picks, and traced a circle on each cake.
That's to make sure that ends will meet.

After tracing that limit, I carved in one of the cakes a V shape - the bottom of the heart -, and in the other one I carved a W shape - the top part of the heart.
I used spoon and knife for that.

Next thing I mixed a little bit of the frosting (in my case, orange jam) with the colored cake crumble. I think I've put in too much jam, because it became much more humid than it should.
With those colored crumbles I fill in the carved spaces.
Before doing that, it's a good idea to identify which is which.

I put the cakes in the freezer to let them set.
When I took them out I spread the jam over the bottom part of the heart (the V shape), and delicately turned the top part (W shape) over it, pressing lightly to "glue" them together.

I've put the cake in the fridge a little more.
I've come up with this idea of using cookie glaze to frost the cake, but actually it didn't come out so well. Next time I'll make a chocolate sauce or something, because I really don't like the texture/taste of whipped cream nor buttercream.

The important part of making this cake was the challenge and showing affection.
I'll be trying again and learning better sometime.