This dessert soars! Truly.
If you read Blue Cayenne regularly, you know that I have a love affair with plums. I can’t be sure, but I think I would choose plums if I were stranded on a dessert desert island. That and vanilla ice cream and a good Malbec.
This recipe is from a dessert cookbook co-authored by Yotam Ottolenghi and Helen Goh. You remember Ottolenghi, of course. I’ve written about him a number of times on Blue Cayenne. He is the Israeli-born London superstar chef and restauranteur with five best-selling cookbooks and a unique way of incorporating Middle Eastern flavors into mostly vegetarian-forward dishes. Goh is a Malaysian-born Austrailian-raised chef who has worked with Ottolenghi for ten years as the lead product developer for his food businesses. (She also has a Ph.D. in psychology!) Together, they have written a dessert cookbook titled Sweet. You can buy their book here.
Today’s Blue Cayenne recipe post is for an Almond Butter Cake With Cardamom and Baked Plums from the Ottolenghi/Goh book. The forward to the recipe recounts Goh, then pastry chef at Melbourne’s Donovans, searching for an extra- special dessert to serve to two VIP guests at the restaurant. She served this cake with baked Morello cherries to wild applause. Here is my adaptation of that recipe.
Save RecipeIngredients
- 1 lb. 7 oz. whole red plums
- 1/2 C. dry white wine
- 1/2 C. plus 2 t. granulated sugar
- 10 cardamom pods (roughly crushed in a pestle and mortar) or 1 t. cardamom powder
- 1/4 t. ground cinnamon
- 1 long strip of orange peel
- 1/2 C. water
- 8 oz. almond paste (broken into 4 or 5 pieces)
- 1 C. granulated sugar
- 1 C. plus 1 1/2 T. unsalted butter (at room temperature)
- Finely grated zest of one large orange (about 1 T.)
- 3/4 t. ground cardamom (freshly ground if possible)
- 6 large eggs (room temperature)
- 1/8 t. almond extract
- 1 C. plus 1 T. all-purpose flour
- 2 T. cornstarch
- 1 1/2 t. baking powder
- 1/4 t. salt
- Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream for topping
Instructions
- To bake the plums, wash plums and remove stems. Leave plums whole (but remember to warn your guests that the stones are still in the baked plums). Put plums in an 8-inch square baking dish.
- Make the poaching liquid for the plums. Put white wine, sugar, cardamom, cinnamon, orange peel and water into a saucepan and bring the mixture to a boil. When the poaching liquid boils, remove it from the heat and pour it over the plums. Cover the plums tightly with aluminum foil and bake at 400 degrees F. for 20-40 minutes. The timing depends upon the size of the plums. When cooked you want the plums to be soft but whole. When baked, set the plums aside. You can serve them at room temperature but I liked them a whole lot better warm.
- Lower oven temperature to 350 degrees F.
- Use a 9-inch bundt pan for this recipe. Prepare the pan by greasing it carefully to ensure that your cake comes out cleanly.
- Using a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, put the almond paste pieces into the mixer along with the sugar and beat the mixture for about three minutes at low speed. Add the room-temperature butter, orange zest and ground cardamom and continue to beat the mixture. Add the room-temperature eggs one at a time to the almond paste mixture. Stop occasionally and scrape down the sides of your mixer bowl. Beat after each egg addition until the egg is well incorporated into the batter. Add almond extract and mix.
- In a separate bowl, sift the flour, cornstarch, baking powder and salt together. Then, mix the sifted dry mixture to the almond paste/egg batter until the dry ingredients are just mixed (low speed on your mixer). Do not overmix here.
- Spoon the batter into the prepared bundt pan and bake for 50-55 minutes at 350 degrees F. When you cake is done, you will be able to insert a skewer in the center of the cake and have the skewer come out clean. Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool in the pan for at least 15 minutes. Invert the cake onto a cake plate.
- This cake can be served warm or at room temperaure. You can either break up some of the baked plums and spoon them over the cake (with some of their juices) or you can serve a whole baked plum beside the slice of cake. Remember to warn your guests that the stones are still in the plums!
- I served this with whipped cream but it would be wonderful served with vanilla ice cream. (See Easiest Vanilla Ice Cream recipe on Blue Cayenne. http://bluecayenne.com/easiest-vanilla-ice-cream). Sprinkle a bit of extra granulated sugar over the plums if you wish.
