German-Style Plum Cake

By Angelika Hanna

We are in early September. The grocery stores are filled with harvest goodies in the produce ail. There are bushels of all kinds of vegetables and baskets with late summer/early fall fruits. Among the fruits we harvest in the late summer/early fall in Ontario (and back in Germany too!) are the purple plums.

When I grew up in Germany, my mother made traditionally, every year in early September, a plum cake. I have never done it so far, I guess, because I loved my mom’s plum cake so much that I thought I couldn’t make it as deliciously as she did. But this year, I am going to try it, using my mother’s recipe.

Recipe:

Prep Time: 30 min

Bake Time: 45 min

Total Time: 75 min

Yield: 1 baking sheet

Cuisine: German

Author: Angelika Hanna / Zest4Food

Ingredients:

For the dough:

• 7 ounce sour cream
• 6 tbsp milk
• 8 tbsp vegetable or canola oil
• 1 egg
• 2/3 cup white sugar
• 1 tbsp (1 package) vanilla sugar
• 1 pinch of salt
• 3/4 cup white all-purpose flour
• 1 package baking powder

For the fruit topping:

• Purple plums, un-pitted, cut in half and split

For the Streusel topping:

• 8 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp (1 package) Vanilla sugar
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup white all-purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon powder

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 385 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. In a large bowl, combine the wet ingredients using a hand mixer.
3. In a medium bowl, mix together the dry ingredients.
4. Spoon the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and combine to a smooth dough.
5. Grease an oven-proof 13x9x2 inch sheet pan with oil or butter.
6. Spread the dough evenly across the sheet pan.
7. Top with the plums, skin side down, pressing the fruit slightly into the dough.
8. Crumble the Streusel with your hand all over the plums.
9. Bake for 45 min.
10. Let cool off before serving.

Guten Appetit!