I *Heart* Cake and Ice Cream

Okay, I admit it. I didn't plan ahead for our Valentine's Day dessert. When short on time (or to save face!) try a quick ice cream cake.

I prepared a delicious chocolate cake and poured the batter into a half sheet pan (jelly roll type baking sheet). Because the batter is spread so thin, it bakes in under a half hour. After the cake is cooled, I used a large heart shape cookie cutter to cut out the heart cakes.

Using the same cookie cutter, I pressed soft vanilla ice cream into the cutter to make heart shaped blocks of ice cream. The heart shaped ice cream was placed on a small cookie sheet lined with wax paper. Once the ice cream shapes were made, I placed those back into the freezer until I was ready to assemble the cakes.

To assemble, place one heart shaped cake on the dessert plate and top with one of the heart shaped ice cream molds. Top with another heart shaped cake. I melted chocolate with some heavy cream and drizzled it over the top of the moist chocolate layer. Voila! a successful dessert for my special Valentine!