I was driving home a few days ago and I heard this food story on NPR about a plum cake with a ridiculously long and complicated German name, "zwetchgendatschi". I was intrigued and tried to google it but I had no clue how to spell it, and my phonetic spelling of it was WAY off. I eventually found it by adding "NPR" to my google search....
So yesterday I went to Fresh and Easy to get my $3.99 salad for lunch, and I saw a 2 lb. bag of plums for 89 cents! I love fruit and I love bargains, so I bought the plums. Then I remembered the NPR plum cake story and looked up the recipe. It's all stuff I already have in my kitchen -- flour, sugar, butter, corn starch. So the baking adventure was on! It turned out pretty good! It has LOTS of fruit and the pie shell is really yummy and sweet.
Recipe: Zwetschgendatschi
Crust
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup cornstarch
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, very cold, cut into small pieces
1 egg yolk
1 1/2 tablespoons sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Filling
3 pounds Damson/Italian prune plums (I used the 2-lb. bag of regular plums from Fresh & Easy and I could barely stuff all of them in)
To Finish:
1 tablespoon raw sugar (I had brown sugar)
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. For the crust, using the bowl of a food processor fitted with the blade attachment, pulse together the flour, cornstarch, sugar, and salt. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal.
In a small bowl, whisk together the egg yolk, sweetened condensed milk and vanilla. Slowly add the egg yolk mixture to the flour mixture while pulsing; continue until the dough just begins to come together.
Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Gently knead it until the dry ingredients are fully integrated and the dough holds together, being careful not to overwork it. Press the dough into a disk and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Spray an 8-inch fluted tart pan with nonstick cooking spray. Crumble the majority of the dough into the tart pan and gently press onto the bottom and up the sides so that you have at least 1/8 inch of crust all around. If you have extra dough left over once you've completely covered the tart pan, set it aside.
For the filling, split each plum along the natural seam and remove the stone, leaving the plum still hinged on the backside like a little book. (This was the hardest part of the recipe, getting the seed out)
Arrange the plums upright on the uncooked dough, flesh side facing in. If you have any leftover tart dough, crumble it evenly on top of the plums. Sprinkle the raw sugar over the plums as well.
Bake the tart until the sides of the dough are golden brown and the plums are tender, about 45 minutes. If the plums begin to brown before they are tender, carefully cover them with aluminum foil and continue baking until the juices of the plums start running.
