Hi Pim and excellent question!
I wish I had a better answer, but it is not currently possible to have a single event with multiple start dates. As you noted, this would require using the Recurring Events feature in PRO, but it sounds like that won’t be a good fit. Plus, recurring events do not currently support tickets (that is coming though), so that’s another strike.
Sorry for the bad news, but does this at least help answer your question? Feel free to let me know if I can help answer anything else and I’d be happy to!
Geoff