With Easter it was also the birthday of my mother in law. And as I like to cook and am not to bad in making cakes I thought I make her a birthday cake.
First i baked 2 heart shape cakes, The recipe i used for that is
225 g flour
2 tsp baking powder
225 g sugar
225 margarine *
4 eggs
Grease the baking tins
preheat oven on 200 degrees celcius
Mix all the ingredients together until smooth.
divide evenly over the 2 tins and bake in a preheated oven for about 50 minutes, or until well risen and golden.
Let cool down and add jam or cream as a filling on one layer and place then the other one on top. Lightly cover with apricot jam to make it sticky so the decoration stays better.
For the decoration i used fondant, which you can buy ready made but i choose to make it myself. There are different recipes you can find on the net on how to make it. I usually make it this way.
450 g icing sugar (zucchero a velo of poedersuiker)
1 1/2 tsp gelatin powder
2 tbsp water
1 1/2 tbsp liquid glucose
2 tsp glycerin
Dissolve the gelatin powder on low heat in the water, add the glucose and the glycerin, and mix well.
Take of the heat and start adding the icing sugar, and when you cant stir anymore with a spoon start kneading it in with you hands until you have a firm ball. Then roll it out until it is big enough to cover the cake.
The original recipes all say to cover the cake first with marzipan but we find that to heavy so i do not do it like that.
When the fondant is on i start getting creative and decorate the cake. For this one i used markers with food coloring inside. I really like the result and on how easy they where to use. I bought them here.
Or you can use the leftover fondant, or make some new and color it with with food coloring and make shapes out of it like i did for the birthday of Daniele last year.
*Edit March 1st 2016: Note that, since I originally posted this recipe, I stopped using margarine (for health reasons) and use only butter or oil in my baking. For more info https://jyothi.muscetta.com/why-i-stopped-using-margarine/
