Plum-Peach Olive Oil Cake (Plus, Big News!)

114 CommentsSunday • August 16, 2009 • by Ari

If there’s one thing that always drives me nuts it’s produce gone to waste. There are two reasons for this: first, produce is darn expensive and throwing out plums, peaches or pears that are just a touch too ripe for impromptu snacking seems like such a waste; and second, it makes me very sad to think of all the “produce saving” cakes and buckles that aren’t being made. What a shame!

So today, when I noticed that the silver hued bowl that houses produce on my kitchen table had a lonely plum, peach and lemon in it, I knew I had to find a way to use them. The plum and peach were too ripe for snacking, and though I could have sliced the lemon and added the pieces to a cool pitcher of water (perfect hot weather refreshment!) I decided to defy the 95 degree F weather outside and bake a cake. A small cake though. That bakes fast.

The recent edition of Martha Stewart’s Food Magazine had the winning recipe, catching my eye with a mouth watering image of a plum cake dusted with confectioners sugar. I modified the recipe by replacing half the plum slices with peach slices, substituting olive oil for butter, adding baking powder and swapping plain yogurt for sour cream. The end result was a delicious and relatively healthy little Plum & Peach Olive Oil Cake that came together in 10 minutes and baked in 35. Not bad for a hot day, and even better when served with vanilla ice cream. Mmm mm.

This is why I think it’s such a shame to toss super ripe fruit.

Now before the recipe I feel like I owe you an explanation for dropping off the face of the blogosphere for more than a month. Blogging was out. Twitter was nearly out. And Facebook was definitely an infrequent friend. Why the sudden shift? Well, first there was the fact that we moved to a new apartment, but really the reason is that… I’m pregnant! That’s right, this foodie household has a very special bun in the oven and the 1st trimester did me in with overwhelming exhaustion and a complete lack of interest in food. I’ll spare you all the details but let’s just say that I didn’t enjoy the rocking motion of the cruise ship we were on in May as much as I might have otherwise. Hoo boy.

At our last doctor’s visit we got a great little photo of the baby, which I hope you won’t mind my sharing. I’m so happy I can tell you! It was so hard to keep it a secret. I’m almost 17 weeks along now and due in late January 2010.

OMG!

We still haven’t decided if we’re going to find out the gender before it’s born. Here’s a question for the parents out there: did you find out beforehand?

Ok, enough dilly dallying – here’s the recipe. Enjoy!

Plum-Peach Olive Oil Coffee Cake
Adapted from Martha Stewart Food

Ingredients: Makes 1

• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons finely grated lemon zest
• 1/4 cup plain yogurt (or, sour cream)
• 1 1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus a touch more for tossing with fruit
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 large plum, halved, pitted and cut into eight slices
• 1 large peach, halved, pitted and cut into eight slices

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F. Grease an 8-inch spring form pan with baking spray, such as PAM. Set aside.

In a large bowl using a spoon, thoroughly combine the olive oil, sugars, eggs, vanilla extract, lemon zest and yogurt.

In a small bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

Add the flour mixture to the olive oil mixture in two batches, mixing until just combined. Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top with the back of your spoon.

Toss the plum and peach slices with about 2 teaspoons of flour (I just grabbed a few generous pinches of flour and mixed it all up). Sprinkle the fruit slices over the batter, then bake the cake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Loosely tent the with aluminum foil and continue to bake until the sides of the cake pull away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, 5-10 more minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing the sides of the pan. Dust with confectioners sugar and serve, warm and with vanilla ice cream if you like.