text: The Old Foodie: Cakes for Valentine's Day (1930's).
  I am keeping it sweet and simple today with some sweet and simple (and not so simple) cakes for Valentine's Day, because nothing says love better than a cake. Or chocolate. Or champagne.
  Gingerbread Hearts for Valentine's Day.
  To 1 lb. 1½ oz. flour allow 1 lb. 1½ oz. honey, 1 tablespoon baking powder, 2 tablespoons brandy or rum, ½ teaspoon each of cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg, all finely ground to powder.
  Heat the honey in a double boiler, but do not allow It to boil; add the flour and spirits. Mix to a smooth paste. Pour out on a pastry board, sprinkle the baking powder and the spices all over, and knead thoroughly on a floured board, then roll to half inch thickness. Have ready some heart shapes in cardboard, place on the dough, and cut out with a .sharp knife. Warm a baking tin slightly, grease it, and put in the hearts, pricking them here and there with a wooden toothpick to prevent bubbles forming. Bake slowly. When finished ice the hearts first with white icing, and then drop on little quantities of red icing, shaping them into small hearts. Or if liked, tiny red hearts may be cut out of paper and pasted on the white icing with white of egg.
  Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Qld.) of 13 February 1938
  Beat l oz. butter to a cream and add l oz. castor sugar. Beat the mixture until it is quite smooth and creamy. Beat together 1 oz. flour, a small ½ teaspoon baking powder and a pinch of salt, Separate the white from the yolk of an egg. Add the flour and beaten egg yolk alternately to the butter and sugar, then gradually stir in 1 tablespoon milk and the grated rind of ¼ lemon and ½ orange. Beat the egg yolk to a stiff froth, fold into the mixture and pour into a heart-shaped cake tin, which has been brushed with melted butter. Bake in a fairly hot oven for 15 minutes or until the cake is light and spongy. Leave still quite cold, then cut in two crosswise. Put halves together with a layer of jelly cut to the same shape. Cover cake with icing made by mixing icing sugar with orange and lemon juice, and when set decorate with an arrow made with sliver cachous. If no heart-shaped cake tin is available, make a heart-shape in cardboard and cut cake to shape.
  Sunday Times (Perth, WA) 10 February 1935.
  An easy way to make a heart-shaped cake if you don't have a heart-shaped pan is to bake the batter in two pans, one round, one square. Cut the round cake into two half-circles, and put one alongside each of two sides of the square ... voila!