Heart Cake
On friday, Navya came home from school totally excited, and the reason was she got to bring “Eli Monkey”, her class pet/toy, home. She had been waiting for this day for a very long time and finally got her turn. So this weekend was all about “Eli & Navya,” and we started the “celebration” with a pizza for dinner. The whole of saturday we did many things with, for and only for Eli. And since no celebration is a celebration without a cake, we decided to make one.
The first thing that came to my mind, when I saw Eli was “pomegranate”. When I was a kid, every year we used to visit my uncle during our summer vacation and they had a big pomegranate tree right in front of their house. I still can’t say for sure, whether it was the number of monkeys or the number of fruits on that tree – which was more at any point in time. They loved the pomegranate. And, those monkeys were so tiny like Eli. The interesting thing is, pomegranate is Navya’s favorite thing to take for school snack. Given a chance, she will take it every single day. So I felt it would be fun to make a cake with pomegranate, a favorite of Eli and Navya. And since Valentine’s Day, Navya’s favorite day of the year, is only a week from today, we decided to surprise her with a cake with a ‘pink heart’. That is the story of this vegan, gluten-free, nut-free, raw valentine’s day cake which Navya named as “Heart cake”. Knowing how good pomegranate is for the heart, I couldn’t have thought of a better name!
Heart Cake
We made a 5 inch square cake, approximately 1 inch thick.No need to exactly follow the ingredients or measurements; just go with your heart!
One and a half cups of quinoa puffs
15 dates (kept at room temperature for 8-10 hrs)
2 tablespoons of coconut oil
One tablespoon of raw cocoa nibs (optional)
A few (about 15) raspberries pureed in a blender
Powder the cocoa nibs and quinoa puffs in a blender; unseed and chop the dates and blend it for a minute or so. Mix it with coconut oil and one or two spoons of the raspberry puree. Consistency should feel like a cookie dough. Apply a few drops of coconut oil on a plate and shape the mixture it into a square or as you like, simply using your hand. Cover it with a plastic wrap and chill it in a refrigerator for a few minutes.
To decorate:
2-3 key limes
1 pomegranate
Take out the cake from the refrigerator, remove the plastic wrap. Draw the shape of a heart using a tooth pick. Apply a couple of spoons of the remaining raspberry puree inside the heart. This will help the toppings stick to the cake. Using a microplane, collect the zest from the key limes. Sprinkle over the cake carefully all around the heart. Take the seeds out of the pomegranate and sprinkle it over the heart. Enjoy… it tastes absolutely delicious!
