Images / Copyright Mike Ahern
Plums seem to be a bit of a family tradition for me, although I confess I don't grow my own at the cottage, my grandparents and great-grandparents were home growers, and I can distinctly remember my childhood curiosity at being able to pluck food from their trees and eat it!
Well today, I am turning to the good old Plum once again for some much sought after comfort eating. This bake is packed full of flavours and textures with the chopped hazelnuts delivering a subtle crunch to the sponge, whilst the dark chocolate chunks bring a sweet and indulgent twist. The softened baked plums are divine and their juices released during the baking process, bring together the overall flavour.
A must-have Autumn bake!
Ingredients:
5 Plums
170g Self-raising flour
170g Light Muscovado sugar
170g Unsalted butter
3 Medium eggs
50g Dark chocolate chunks
50g Chopped Hazelnuts
1 tsp Baking powder
3 tsp Plum jam (or flavour of your choice)
How to make:
Grease a 20cm cake tin and preheat the oven to 180oc. Take 3 of the plums, cut these in half and de-stone. Place the halved plums to one side. De-stone the remaining two plums and chop into uneven pieces. Roughly break apart the dark chocolate into uneven small-ish chunks.
Put the butter, flour, sugar, eggs, chopped hazelnuts and baking powder into a mixing bowl and using an electric mixer, blend these ingredients together until smooth and creamy. Add the chocolate pieces and chopped plums and gently mix in with the other ingredients. Add the mixture to the baking tin.
Position the halved plums on top of the mixture, pressing down lightly and then place the cake tin in the oven to bake for around 40-45 minutes.
Remove from the oven and allow the cake to cool slightly before removing from the tin and placing on a wire rack. Once the cake is completely cool, gently heat the plum jam until runny, and then brush this over the top of the cake.
