Strawberry Heart Cake

Ingredients

• 150 g flour (Type 550)
• 100 g cold butter
• 1 egg
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 0.5 tsp Salt
• 0.5 l milk
• 1 vanilla pod
• 5 egg yolks
• 100 g sugar
• 30 g flour
• 1 pinch salt
• 300 g ripe strawberries
• powdered sugar (for dusting)
• 250 g legumes (e.g., beans, peas..)

Instructions

1. 1.

   Preheat the oven to 180°C fan.

2. 2.

   Cut the butter into small pieces. Knead the flour with the butter, egg, sugar and salt into a shortcrust dough. Wrap the dough in cling film and chill for 30 minutes. Roll out the dough on a floured surface, line an oiled heart-shaped pan and lift up the edges. Prick the dough with a fork and sprinkle with legumes. Bake in the hot oven for 20 minutes until golden brown. Remove the legumes and let the base cool in the pan.

3. 3.

   Carefully (so it doesn’t break) remove the cake from the pan and place on a serving plate.

4. 4.

   For the vanilla custard cut the pod lengthwise, scrape out the seeds and whisk them into the milk; bring to a boil. Beat the egg yolks with sugar until creamy, gradually fold in the flour by tablespoon. Slowly stir the hot milk into the yolk mixture, then return everything to the pot, remove the pod and thicken over low heat while constantly stirring (do not boil!). Strain the custard, let it cool, dust the surface lightly with sugar to prevent a skin from forming.

5. 5.

   Fill the shortcrust heart with the vanilla custard and smooth it. Wash, dry and slice the strawberries. Top the heart with strawberry slices, gently pressing them into the custard. Chill until serving, then dust with powdered sugar and garnish with rose petals if desired.