Pink Ombré Valentines Cake

Vegan.

Happy Gal-entines day!

Love is in the air with my pink ombré cake, with 3 layers of pink cake, pink ombré buttercream, an iced sugar cookie and ‘LoveHeart’ sweets!

This cake is romantic, what better way to show you love someone than with a slice of delicious and sweet cake?

Preparation- 1 hour

Baking time- 28-30 minutes

Serves- Approximately 10-12

Level- Medium

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Ingredients for the cake

-480ml of dairy-free milk

-2 teaspoons of apple cider vinegar

-420g of self-raising flour

-470g of golden caster sugar

-1 teaspoon of baking powder

-1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda

-120g of coconut oil (melted)

–Pink food gel

Ingredients for the buttercream

-210g of dairy-free butter

-500g of icing sugar

-1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

–Pink food gel

-Dairy-free milk (if needed)

Extras

-1 pack of LoveHeart sweets

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To make the cakes

Step 1- Preheat your oven to 180 degrees c and line three 6 inch cake tins with grease-proof paper.

Step 2- In a bowl, combine the dairy-free milk with the apple cider vinegar and whisk until fully combined.

Set aside for 10 minutes to curdle. This creates a vegan ‘buttermilk’.

Step 3- In a large mixing bowl, sift the flour, sugar, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda. Mix well to combine.

Step 4- Add the melted coconut oil into the ‘buttermilk’ and whisk to combine.

Step 5- Mix in the pink food gel into the liquid mixture until combined.

Step 6- Add the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix.

Step 7- Pour equal amounts of batter into the lined cake tins.

Make sure to tap the tins on the worktop to remove any air bubbles.

Step 8- Pop the cakes into the center of the preheated oven and bake for around 28-30 minutes. You will know they are baked when you put a knife or skewer in and it comes out clean and they are springy to the touch.

Step 9- Place the cakes on a cooling rack and allow to cool fully.

Once cool, pop them into a sealed container to keep them fresh before frosting.

To make the buttercream

Step 1- In a bowl/stand mixer, cream the butter on high then add in the icing sugar and vanilla extract.

Whip together until combined, light and fluffy.

Add a splash of dairy-free milk if too thick.

Step 2- Divide the buttercream into 3 separate bowls.

Step 3- Add a drop of pink food gel into one of the bowls, add 2 drops of pink food gel to the second bowl, and leave the third bowl as vanilla.

You want the colours to go from white, light pink to a darker pink.

Add a splash of dairy-free milk if too thick.

Step 4- Stack and fill the cake with white buttercream, then crumb coat the whole cake with the buttercream and pop into the fridge to set.

This will take around 1 hour.

Step 5- Using a spatula or piping bag, apply the buttercream to the cake, with the darkest shade at the bottom leading up to the white buttercream.

It doesn’t have to be neat at this stage, just make sure the whole cake is covered in buttercream.

Step 6- Using a smooth or textured cake scraper or large spatula, smooth out the buttercream.

Step 7- Add any leftover buttercream into a piping bag fitted with an open star tip nozzle and add a swirl onto the top of the cake (optional).

To decorate, I make a sugar cookie iced to look like a large ‘LoveHeart’ and placed it on top of the cake, with Love heart sweets trailing down the edge of the cake!

Serve fresh or store in a sealed container in the fridge, the buttercream will firm up at room temperature.

Best eaten within a few days!

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