Madeira cake with a heart
Ingredients
- 2 x 250 g softened butter
- 2 x 5 eggs
- 2 x 150 g cane sugar
- 2 x 2 sachets of vanilla sugar
- 2 x grated zest of 1⁄2 untreated lemon
- 2 x 1 pinch of salt
- 2 x 125g light spelt flour
- 2 x 125 g cornstarch
- 2 x 1 tsp baking powder
- Red food dye
Instructions
1. Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Grease a loaf tin with butter and dust with flour.
2. Melt 250 g of butter in a saucepan on low heat, and let cool until lukewarm.
3. Beat 5 eggs in a bowl. Add 150 g of sugar and vanilla sugar, and beat until creamy. Stir in the zest of 1⁄2 lemon and a pinch of salt.
4. Mix 125 g flour with 125 g cornstarch and 1 teaspoon baking powder. Fold the flour mixture and melted butter into the custard, alternating between the two.
5. Add some red food dye to the batter and pour into the loaf tin. Smooth with a spatula and bake for 1 hour on the bottom rack in the oven. Then perform a chopstick test to see if the cake is done. Let the red Madeira cake cool for about 10 minutes, then remove from the mould and let cool completely.
6. Cut the cake into slices thick enough to punch out some heart shapes with a cookie cutter. Leftover bits of cake can be eaten immediately.
7. Repeat steps 1-4 of the above recipe to prepare a second batch of cake batter.
8. Cover the bottom of the 2nd cake tin with a thin layer of undyed batter. Line up the red cake hearts in the batter, very close together. Cover with the rest of the batter, filling the cake tin.
9. Bake in the preheated oven for about 1 hour, then perform the chopstick test. Let the cake cool for 10 minutes before unmoulding. Let cool completely on a wire rack and dust with icing sugar before serving.