Love is in the air!
Valentine’s Day in the bakery is such a pretty holiday!
All pinks and reds and hearts all over the place!
What an eye popping array of cakes in the display case when you walked into my store and saw all these cakes!
Here is one example of a cake I would sell for Valentine’s Day and I hope you will want to recreate it for your special someone!
It is a very simple vanilla cake baked in a heart shaped pan with vanilla buttercream but simple is quite delicious!
Ombre colors from dark pink to light and buttercream roses to decorate the top. (Be sure to scroll all the way to the bottom of this post to see how to make buttercream roses!)
Today I decided to add a little gold to this cake as well with a sugar drip painted with gold luster dust mixed with a little vodka.
Check out how easy it really is to make this cake!
- Ground Flax Seeds 4 tablespoons (32g)
- Hot Water 10 tablespoons (150ml)
- Soy Milk 1 cup (237ml)
- Vanilla Extract 2 teaspoon (10ml)
- Cake Flour 2½ cup (300g)
- Granulated Sugar 1¼ cup (250g)
- Baking Powder 4 teaspoons (20g)
- Salt ½ teaspoon (3g)
- Vegan Butter 12 Tablespoons (170g)
- 1 recipe Buttercream of your choice *I used the American Buttercream
- For the Sugar Glaze:
- 1 cup confectioners sugar
- 1 Tbs almond milk- adjust to your desired consistency
- Gold Luster Dustfor garnish *optional
- combine the flax meal with the hot water and let stand for about 5 minutes to thicken
- Add the vanilla to the soy milk
- Sift the flour with the baking powder and salt
- Cream the vegan butter with the sugar until light and fluffy and this may take about 3-5 minutes on medium to high speed
- Add the thickened flax paste while mixing on medium speed, scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl to incorporate evenly
- Add about ⅓ of the flour to the creamed mixture then add half of the soy milk
- Add another ⅓ of the flour and then the remaining soy milk
- Add the last amount of flour and mix just to combine evenly.
- Divide the batter evenly into 4 bowls and color them from darker pink to light pink (almost white)
- Bake for 25 minutes in a greased and parchment lined heart shaped pan or until they are springy to the touch when you gently press the centers.
- Meanwhile prepare the buttercream recipe of your choice as per the instructions on that recipe.
- Divide the buttercream into 4 equal bowls leaving 1 portion white and the other 3 in ombre pinks.
- Decorate as shown in the video.
- For the sugar glaze combine the confectioners sugar with the almond milk and pipe around the edge of the cake.
- Once the sugar glaze has dried, paint it with gold luster dust mixed with a bit of vodka to make a paint-able paste.
For longer storage keep in the refrigerator for up to 1 week
Check out how to make buttercream roses!
Hi Gretchen, kindly let me know where I can find these gadgets for decorating cakes – I need the entire set
HI There, unfortunately I no longer sell the cake kits which included all of the tips & pastry bags, but you can find everything on Amazon nowadays.
I use Ateco tips #21 for the shell border in this video
Hey Gretchen!!! I’m in love with the gold drip! I’m actually getting ready to make an 8” round with a gold drip, but want to have the ganache on the top as well. Do you think I could get away with using just one container of luster dust? Thanks in advance for your input and as always you have amazing recipes!!
great thanks and you are welcome too! yes to 1 jar is more than enough
I just got your book in the mail. I had pre-ordered it and I’m THRILLED. I like the size, the weight, the professional pictures, and as I went through and marked the recipes I want to try, I realized I’d be quite busy for a few months. I have moderate experience as a vegan baker so a lot of recipes I sort of know by trial and error and have made a lot of mistakes. I also found out the hard way, that sometimes recipes are not tested before being published in a book. So, I compared several of my successes to proportions and ingredients and was very pleased. I know this isn’t a review of any actual recipes, but I am very confident in having successes. Thank you!
thank you for the review so far I hope you continue to love the book!
Gretchen if I don’t have cake flour, ehat can I use to have the same success with the recipe, thank you!
You can use AP i have done it that way too and its fine!
Can you use normal ingredients instead of vegan? I’m not a fan
Oh bummer, perhaps you have had some inferior vegan baked goods then because these recipes are awesome!! But, Sure you can use whatever recipe you like
Hi Gretchen, this is Remy from the Philippines I just had few question about you butter cream using to make a flowers .
how long you leaved your flowers on a room temperature ?
why you flowers it look pretty it doesn’t sag?
here in the Philippines is hot and hummed one’s I make the flowers the longest I can keep on a room temperature is just 1 to 2 hours…..
thanks Remy
HI Remy, be sure to use shortening in your buttercream recipe. I sometimes freeze the flowers click here when I make them in bulk to use on alot of cakes at one time, but if you are in very humid climates, this may be worse since the extra condensation from the freezer to room temperature may cause more problems. The buttercrem roses will stay at room temp for a couple days
Hey Gretchen, if I made this in round tins how many tins should I use? Love your recipes and want to try to turn this one into a round birthday cake. Thanks 😉
4- 7″ 0R 3- 8″ cake pans! and thank you!!
Hi Gretchen, I experimented using three 8” cake tins and turned it into a Vanilla and Rose layer cake for my friends birthday today. She was absolutely delighted. Thanks for sharing your recipes! ??
ahahaha. Love it when you say things like “didn’t wash the pan, I’m unsubscribing”. I can just see people doing that. But why? It’s a tutorial video. Anyway, the cake looks amazing. I’m going to try it, even though I’m not vegan.
Love watching your tutorials, Gretchen and LOVE your recipes. Still making the white cake these days 🙂
LOL! Yeah I get a kick out of myself sometimes LOL thanksssss! <3
Hi Gretchen
I have been trying to open your old website gretchensbakery.
It is not accessible.
Have you shut it down?
Thanks
Pratibha
Hi Pratibha, Yes, my non vegan blog is shut down
I just couldn’t keep up the cost to host it on the internet and maintain it monthly anymore
I had always said I would continue to share my recipes for free & give free tutorials on YouTube for as long as I could afford to do so, and well.. I just can’t anymore
The cost to host such a huge database was close to $400 a month (with the maintenance cost, I needed to hire a tech guy to help keep it running smoothly)
So that cost was severely outweighing any small profits I had been making though running ads on the videos & blogsite.
I have not kept any of the non vegan recipes, since for over 4 years now I have been strictly vegan;
so for me they are of no use.
Not to mention I am not comfortable sharing non vegan recipes anymore,
as it promotes animal abuse and torture not to mention animal agriculture is a disease on the earth as well as human health.
Thanks for your support and encouragement though the ages!
~Gretchen
I have a 10 inch heart shaped cake pan will this recipe work for this pan?
Yes, you will only get 3 thinner layers though, so perhaps you will want to DOUBLE the recipe instead??