Can I just say . . . OMG! Talk about fantastic. Bursting with flavor. From one spectrum to the other – the sweet from the sugar sprinkled on top that gives it crunch – to the plums themselves which are a bit on the tart side.

The day I baked this I had plums on hand – the first I’ve seen of the season. I’d bought them 3-4 days before and knew I needed to use them asap. I had strawberries just past their peak and had decided to try a new recipe for strawberry buttermilk ice cream. I’ll be posting about that recipe too. And Dave had purchased a flat of peaches at Costco, and they were all (12 of them) RIPE! So I started working in the kitchen. The ice cream was first. While it was churning, I started on a peach chutney which I’m going to serve soon with a pork dinner. I’ll post that one too. Thirdly, I whipped up the plum torte.

You may remember, this is the recipe that has received the most raves by readers of  The New York Times, and the most requested recipe as well. Now I see why. And it’s interesting – there’s nothing unusual in the cake. Nothing at all. It’s an easy batter to make. There’s nothing unusual about the plum preparation – in fact there’s nothing to it – you slice them in half, remove the pits and plop them into the springform pan, skin side up, on top of the batter. I will mention – my plums were really large, and I only used 6; the recipe calls for 12. The top is sprinkled with a copious amount of cinnamon and a jot of sugar and into the oven it goes. SO easy. The picture shows it just before I put it in the oven.

Since then I’ve made it numerous times – always to raves – and recently when I couldn’t find plums, I made it with fresh apricots (photo at right). All I’ll say is: the plums are better, but apricots were okay too – but they needed more sugar. I’d suggest if you make it with apricots, when you slice it to serve, take a small bite of both apricot and cake, and if it’s too tart, sprinkle more sugar on top of the cake.

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What I liked: absolutely every single thing – the crunch, the sweet, the tart, and the texture. Yumminess in every single bite. And I did mention, it’s EASY!
What I didn’t like: nothing, nothing, nothing!

A year ago: Bittersweet Chocolate Pear Cake
Two years ago: Beef and Biscuit Casserole (my grandkids’ favorite)
Three years ago: Balsamic Onion Marmalade

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Oh, do I love rhubarb. As I was growing up, my mother used to have a rhubarb patch in our back yard. She’d never let me go cut any of it, though, since the leaves are poisonous. My mom and dad liked stewed rhubarb. Period. Although once in awhile my mother would make a rhubarb pie, perhaps for guests. I rarely make anything with rhubarb because my DH knows that rhubarb requires a lot of sugar to make it palatable. Therefore, he avoids it most of the time and I never make it because of that.

But when were visiting our friends Sue and Lynn, and I asked to help with dinner, she handed me the printout for this one afternoon and I made it according to her recipe. Dave said yes, he’d have some. He loved it. I loved it. Sue and Lynn loved it, of course.

This recipe is quite simple – it comes from cooks.com. One of dozens of such recipes, but this one’s a winner, I think.

You mix up a crumble of oatmeal, flour, sugar, and some melted butter, etc. and half of it goes in the bottom of a glass baking dish. Then the fresh chunked rhubarb goes in on top of it. That’s what you can see in the top photo at left with the cornstarch-based clear sauce that’s poured over the top. The remaining crumbs are sprinkled on top.

Into the oven it goes for about an hour. Or longer if the top doesn’t quite brown sufficiently. You do want it to be a golden brown when it comes out of the oven. The baked version is in the lower photo.

During the baking the sauce and the rhubarb marry and create a lovely loose fruit mixture and the crumbs on top add a delicious crunch.

Serve it with vanilla ice cream or pour over some half and half. Whichever suits you! Thanks, Sue, for a great recipe.

What I liked about it: the flavor, the texture of the topping. Not too sweet. Not too sour. Just right, as the saying goes. Also easy!

What I didn’t like: absolutely nothing.

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A year ago: Caribbean Rice
Two years ago: Corn – everything you ever wanted to know about it
Three years ago: Peaches and Nectarines – everything you ever wanted to know about them
Four years ago: The BEST Bean Salad (a Paul Prudhomme recipe, very low calorie and VERY good)

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Well. Where to start here  . . . the other day I asked my DH if, when he visited Costco, would he please look for any summer fruit. I’m weary of apples and pears. I’m eager for plums to come in since I want to make that New York Times’ #1 requested recipe – a Purple Plum Torte. But plums certainly aren’t in season yet. When he returned he had a big tray of peaches. As hard as rocks, but about 13 or 14 of them. Anxious as he was, he ate one the next day. It was not sweet at all and he could hardly get it down. He thought we’d end up with the entire tray of unripe fruit. But I just let that box sit out on the kitchen counter, the base cradling each individual peach, for about 4 days or so. And sure enough, all the peaches ripened beautifully.  And, as you know with such things, every single one of them ripened the same day. So, I needed to do something with them. We ate a couple, a gave two of them to a friend, but I still had about 9 of them. I used 8 (just a little over 3 pounds) for this dessert.

Over the years I’ve been somewhat unsuccessful with peach cobblers or crisps. I’m finicky when it comes to what I like. One day a few weeks ago we visited a new restaurant in our town and after a nice dinner, we ordered their fruit crisp. My usual question to the waiter is: “Is is really sweet?” Usually they say yes, or fairly so, or something similar, but I try it anyway. And am usually disappointed because most restaurants load them up with too much sugar for my palette. Last summer I recall that I made a peach cobbler – I think it was The Pioneer Woman’s version with a delicious maple syrup enhanced whipped cream. It was good, but still didn’t meet with my dream of a perfect peach crisp.

You see, I like a really crispy crust. What I really want is my mother’s Crisp Apple Pudding but made with peaches. I’ve tried using that recipe, but because peaches have so much fluid in them, it always ends up soggy and never crispy enough. The flour-based topping in that recipe just ends up like gum on top of the peaches. Sigh.

Therefore, this time around, I was on a detective mission. First I went to my resource – Eat Your Books, that website where I have all my cookbooks listed and I just put in my search request and it tells me which cookbooks I own contain a recipe. Well, the list was long – I think there were about 35 versions of Peach Crisp including a few in my barbecue cookbooks, books I’d probably not have looked in for peach recipes! Pulling cookbooks off the shelves, I looked at them. Eliminated all of them made with oatmeal. Not my thing. Didn’t want to mix peaches and blueberries or rhubarb, although there were plenty of those too. America’s Test Kitchen had more than one recipe, but I went to my bookshelf and pulled off the TV Show cookbook I have and read the blurb. The test kitchen chefs had determined a variety of different things about peach crisp – that using all brown sugar was overpowering. Using all white sugar lacked character. So they used half and half. That keeping the topping chilled until just before sprinkling it on top helped make the topping crunchy. That sounded good to me. And although they noted that most peach crisps gave off a lot of watery juice, they preferred the juice without adding cornstarch or flour to the peaches.

Their combination involved pulsing flour, sugar, spices and butter in the food processor (briefly), then adding in some nuts (they used pecans, I wanted walnuts). They felt that combination made the best chemistry for a crisp top. And they added a small amount of sugar to the peaches, but also some lemon zest and lemon juice (that was different). All sounded good on paper. So I put it to the test. It was very easy to make. Just be sure to peel the fruit – I didn’t, a mistake – when baked the peel is kind of stringy, unappetizing  and hard to cut, even though the peaches were almost fuzz-less.

I did have to make this in a larger baking dish – they suggested a 9-inch pie plate. Well, there was no way it would fit! Three pounds of fruit nearly overflowed the pie plate without the topping. And since I doubled the topping, I really did need a bigger dish. But, it was fantastic. I think I may start a new thing here on my blog – at the bottom of each posting, before the pdfs and the recipe, I’m going to tell you in straight talk what I liked and didn’t like about it. So here goes:

What I liked: it had the perfect balance of sweet and tart for me! The contrast of the tart fruit (because it had lemon juice on it, and very little sugar) and the topping (which was sweet with the brown and white sugar combo) was delicious. The chewy nuts added a great texture boost to me. I pulsed them a bit too long (a caution) so they were smaller than expected. Loved the crunchy topping – I actually doubled the topping and I should have baked it a little longer at the higher temp because of that since the center didn’t quite get crunchy enough, which was my fault. Next time I’ll make sure about that.

What I didn’t like: the next day, after being refrigerated, the topping was soggy. All the juice was absorbed into the topping. Alas, there’s not much to be done about that. But it tasted great for breakfast with a bit of milk and fat-free half and half poured over the top). When I served it for dessert the first night, there was a lot of juice in the baking dish – it seemed like too much, but it tasted wonderful – syrupy and tart with the lemon juice. If you really don’t like the juiciness, add about a tablespoon or so of flour or cornstarch to the raw peaches. Maybe the best advice is to make this and eat it all up the first day!

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A year ago: GF Chocolate Shortbread Cookies
Two years ago: Celery, Date, Walnut and Pecorino Salad
Four years ago: Apricot Ice Cream

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You’ve seen this picture before, if you’ve been reading my blog for awhile. It’s something I make every spring when fresh Bing cherries are available. It’s a fantastic topping for vanilla ice cream. Or better yet, the way I served it the other night to dinner guests, in a kind of Eton Mess, a mixture, or layers, or parfait rather, of crumbled meringue cookies, vanilla ice cream, these cherries and a bit of whipped cream, then some of the magnificent juice drizzled on top.

What I like about these is that they’re incredibly easy to make – you do have to pit the cherries. Well, I guess I should say you don’t have to pit them, but I prefer them that way. I use my olive pitter – pictured at right – and it seems to pit cherries like magic.  Once they’re all pitted, marinate the Bing cherries in a little sugar, then add some red wine (or use cranberry juice if you don’t want to use wine). Place them in a large flat sauté pan with a curl of stick cinnamon, a clove, an allspice berry (whole) and you bring it to a simmer and cook for just a short time. Cool. Add a little good, thick balsamic vinegar. Done. They don’t cook long enough to truly “cook” the cherries – they’re almost still fresh/raw, almost but not quite, so they still retain their lovely color.

I try to make this twice during Bing cherry season, and once this compote is made, it keeps for awhile in the refrigerator, so I’ll still have some maybe into late July. You should too.

printer-friendly PDF of just the recipe, or read the original Fresh Bing Cherry Compote blog post I did in 2009. It’s a recipe from Russ Parsons.
Two years ago: Garbanzo Bean, Feta and Cilantro Salad (a real favorite)
Four years ago: Baby Back Ribs with Peanut Butter Slather

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My plan had been that the next recipe I’d try was the Green Goddess dressing in my newest cookbook, The Essential New York Times Cookbook: Classic Recipes for a New Century. But we were invited to some friends for dinner and there would be a crowd, so I offered to make two desserts. With that in mind, there was no question that the 2nd most requested recipe from the New York Times’ recipe archives would be the one I’d try first.

This is an easy recipe. In fact, in Amanda Hesser’s headnote to the recipe she says: “For reasons that elude me, cakes are reputed to require long hours in the kitchen, when anyone who actually makes cakes knows that cookies are the true time suck . . . “ She goes on to say “if you look back in the Times’ archives at recipes from 30+ years ago, when most people cooked every day, there were many more cake recipes. Cake was a staple you whipped up every couple of days, after the previous one had vanished into crumbs.”

What’s great about this cake is that there’s nothing odd in it – you might even have all the ingredients in your pantry right this minute. To me, that’s a bonus if I don’t have to go to the grocery store, or send my DH for me. You just need apples, vegetable oil, walnuts, raisins and eggs. The other items are baking staples. The cake has no frosting or topping at all. That certainly makes it an easy cake.

The cake batter uses vegetable oil instead of butter, which, according to the headnote, makes for a very light crumb. It’s really simple to put together, just as Hesser suggests. The apples can turn brown, so I didn’t do those until the batter was complete – then I just folded them in with the raisins and walnuts. I used my handy-dandy apple corer-cutter. It’s my newest, fun gadget in my kitchen. And when I need apples, this make such quick work of it. You do have to peel the apples first, but it really didn’t take me long then to wham this thing down to get wedges, then I cut each slice in half and into the batter they went.

The cake bakes for 75 minutes in a greased and floured tube pan, then cools before you remove it. I will tell you that my heart skipped a beat when I tried to remove it from the pan. I used a plastic knife kind of thing to clear the edges, pulled it out of the outer form, but then I had to turn it upside down (off that center tube part) and turn it out. My hand isn’t all that big and it was a precarious moment or two before it came loose and plopped, still barely warm into my hand, then I carefully balanced it on its side until I could put it onto the footed cake plate. Whew. If you have a second set of hands, I’d recommend it. I hadn’t let it cool completely to room temp, either, so that might have made a difference since it was almost bendable. It could easily have broken in half – do the deed in a hurry so that doesn’t happen!

The texture of the top of the cake is so interesting – it’s craggy – that’s the best word, and one used by somebody else who made this. You can barely see some of the cracking shards on the top of the cake in the picture –  they cracked even more when I balanced the cake in my hands. A couple of pieces broke off (oh darn, I had to taste them right then and there, of course).

In my book, this would serve a whole lot more than 8 people, but that’s what the recipe says. And the original suggests serving it with vanilla ice cream. By all means do, but Amanda Hesser thought lightly whipped and sweetened heavy cream was better. That was my first choice anyway – for both of the desserts. Amanda suggested mixing some crème fraiche with the whipped cream, which I did. For a cup of whipping cream, after it was whipped I added about 1/3 cup of crème fraiche.

I do want to share with you about my newest gadget for the kitchen. It’s an apple corer. But it’s a different apple corer than some – note the differences between the two photos – in the top one the cuts make 8 wedges. In the bottom one I’ve twisted the unit and it now has 16 cutter blades. That’s what I used for the cake.

The unit is made by Amco, costs about $17, and it’s available through Amazon, if you’re interested – the Amco Dial-A-Slice Adjustable Apple Corer and Slicer (See all Graters, Peelers & Slicers).

You can see how it works – it cuts out the core itself – in the picture at right. I have two other such slicers, but not as good as this one. None of them peel the apples – that’s about the only down side to it. I’ve used it several times, and been pleased each time. It has small clips on the red outer edge – once pulled out slightly the corer rotates to adjust to either setting. It also has a clear base that fits on the cutter blade side so you won’t cut yourself if you leave it in your kitchen drawer.

So, the bottom line? We loved the cake. It was really extra tasty. I cut it into about 20 slices instead of 8. I’ll make it again. In fact I have just one tiny slice that didn’t get eaten and I’ll be enjoying that in the next day or two. Some people eat it for breakfast. That also sounds good! The cake is different – the texture (with the raisins and big chunks of apple) – the top, crackly edges – even the cake part itself. All delicious. Worth making. I see why it’s such a highly requested recipe.

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A year ago: Italian Spaghetti and Meat Sauce, with Meatballs (my old-time favorite I’ve made for about 40 years)
Two years ago: Grilled Caesar Salad

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Really, I have to laugh when I think how many recipes I already have on my blog for types of chocolate tarts, pies, tortes, etc. Then there’s the chocolate cakes. And a variety of other chocolate desserts. We won’t even talk about chocolate cookies and chocolate chip cookies. You’d think I have a thing about chocolate, wouldn’t you? Yup, I do! But this, this silky smooth, dark chocolate filling and crumbly chocolate pie shell are just to-die-for. I wanted more of it – that’s all I got to eat (above) when it was served to me at a cooking class with Tarla Fallgatter. It was still barely warm from the oven and it tasted like liquid chocolate gold.

Tarla explained that the chocolate aspect of this was a happy accident – one of those serendipitous events that changes a recipe. She thought she’d bought just plain dark chocolate (a bar at Trader Joe’s, imported from Belgium), but when she added the chocolate chunks to melt into the filling, she discovered the bar also contained almonds. It was too late at that point, so she used it. Now she doesn’t look back, but always uses the dark chocolate bar with almonds when she makes this.

For those of you who don’t live in Trader Joe’s country, I’m sorry! Just buy any dark chocolate and add some whole, but chopped, toasted almonds. I always buy the Trader Joe’s, big 1-pound chocolate bars – not only because they’re a bargain as chocolate goes, but they sell a really good tasting chocolate. And do serve it with some whipped cream with a little drop or two of almond extract.

So, make this, okay? Especially if you love chocolate!

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A year ago: Chocolate Bacon Bark (yes, it’s fantastic!)
Three years ago: Syrian Pita Bread Salad (one of my favorites)

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This is the final post in the 3-part series about this new cookbook I own. After telling you all about how the book came to be, and the amazing process Amanda Hesser went through to get it accomplished, I thought I should share with you at least one recipe. Actually I’ve made one recipe from the cookbook – the Summer-Squash Casserole I wrote about recently. It was fantastic. I even got my first splotch of food on the page! Darn. I have way too many little yellow and pink stickies poking out of the book, all recipes I want to try. I think my next one will be the 1948 Green Goddess Salad.

In the cookbook Amanda wrote a lengthy headnote about the Purple Plum Torte:

This plum torte is both the most often published and the most requested recipe in the Times archives. By my count, Marian Burros (who was given the recipe by Lois Levine, with whom Burros wrote Elegant but Easy) ran the recipe in the paper twelve times. And when I asked readers for recipe suggestions for this book, 247 people raved about the torte. The plum torte happily lives up to its billing: crusty and light, with deep wells of slackened, sugar-glazed fruit.

I’ve thought a lot about why this torte struck such a chord with people: the answer, I think, is that it’s a nearly perfect recipe. There are only eight ingredients, all of which, except for the plums, you probably already have in your kitchen. There are just four steps, most of which are one sentence long. You need no special equipment, just a bowl, a wooden spoon, and a pan. The batter is like pancake batter, which most everyone is comfortable making. And baked plums are sweet and tart, making the flavor more complex and memorable than a hard-hitting sweet dessert.

It also freezes well. “A friend who loved the torte said that in exchange for two, she would let me store as many as I wanted in her freezer,” Burros wrote one year when she ran the recipe. “A week later, she went on vacation for two weeks and her mother stayed with her children. When she returned, my friend called and asked, ‘How many of those tortes did you leave in my freezer?’

“‘Twenty-four, but two of those were for you.’

“There was a long pause. ‘Well, I guess my mother either ate twelve of them or gave them away.’”

In later versions of the plum torte recipe, Burros cut back the sugar to 3/4 cup—feel free to if you like—and added variations, such as substituting blueberries or apples and cranberries for the plums (I haven’t tried either, but Burros was a fan). She jumped the shark, in my view, though, when she created low-fat variations with mashed bananas and applesauce. While I respect her enthusiasm for innovation, this is one recipe that needs no improvement.—Amanda Hesser

This particular recipe also contained several reader comments (presumably from the 6,000 emails and letters she received from her request for favorite recipes). Most recipes don’t have that much information. At the end of every recipe is the origin of it, the article title it came from, and the date. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reading through recipes by the dozens, and noting the year it was published, like a sour milk cake from 1876 or a sauce for venison from 1880. Or even Dwight Eisenhower’s Steak in the Fire, from 1949, from one or more of his fishing trips to Wisconsin.

Obviously, you can tell, I’m really enjoying this cookbook. If you need a gift for someone, this would be a perfect one. Especially if that person enjoys cooking as well as reading about it. Or buy it for yourself – I don’t think you’ll be a bit sorry you did! The book is a bargain at $23.52 at Amazon.com: The Essential New York Times Cookbook: Classic Recipes for a New Century.

As a result of Amanda’s and Merrill’s collaboration on this cookbook, (they’re now business partners too) they have a blog called Food52, in case you’re interested.

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The other day I was thinking about chocolate. Of late, I haven’t had much chocolate except in an occasional cookie. And what I was craving was a brownie. Then I recalled this recipe, one that was originally published in Chocolatier magazine a very long time ago. A magazine that is no longer, unfortunately. I never subscribed, but occasionally bought an issue. I did a search on the internet just in case it still existed, but could find nothing concrete.

Don’t you just want to reach right into the screen and grab that piece? Way back in about 1989 Chocolatier published an article about the best of the best brownies. We’d been to the home of some business associates of my DH, and the wife, Karen, served these incredible brownies to us, with some good vanilla ice cream. I was smitten with them. Karen kindly snail-mailed me a photocopy of the recipe a week or so later (email didn’t exist back then), and over the years I’ve made these a few times. I’ve just never blogged about them before, so that means I haven’t made them in over 4 years!

You do need both semisweet and dark chocolate to make these. Other than that – and some corn syrup, walnuts and a few eggs, the other ingredients are regular staples in most kitchens. What makes them different? I have no idea, except the combo of the dark and medium chocolate seems in just the right proportion. They’re not overly sweet, which is something that’s important to me. I’m not so much a candy-type person – except for very small pieces, even fudge is too sweet for my taste buds. But these are rich with chocolate, no question about that.

It’s best, really, if you bake these the day before you need them, as they’re more easily cut into bars or squares after they’ve set overnight on your kitchen counter. They like to have a rest (and firm up just a bit) before you easily remove the entire pan full using the foil sling (see photo) and set a knife into them. They keep (closed up in an airtight container) at room temp for about 5 days. Otherwise, freeze them if you think the recipe makes too much for you to eat in that time period. I do love these brownies. Here on my blog I do have another brownie – called Classic Brownies – The Best Ever. And my Heavenly Cream Cheese Brownies too. Oh, I do love those as well. Sigh. I just love chocolate! Anyway, the Classic Brownies are one of my favorites, but they’re quite plain. These, on the other hand, contain nuts and chocolate chunks. There’s a place in my repertoire for both!

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A year ago: Chocolate Chip Cookies – Silver Moon Bakery (a real favorite)
Two years ago: Cornflake Crusted Halibut with Aioli Sauce
Three  years ago: Shrimp Bacon Veggie Chowder

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Can you see the little morsels of Granny Smith apple nestled in the middle of this cake? And the toasted pecans? And the stick-your-spoon-in-it-and-lick-it-clean brandy sauce (drizzle) all around it? Oh my. This is another one of those – if you trust me – you need to make this cake. It’s SO moist. So delicious. It makes a very tender cake (well, it should, since it does have 1 1/2 cups of vegetable oil in it!). The title may be a tad misleading. You’d think it must have some kind of Cajun spices in it with a Cajun name to it. No, it really doesn’t. It’s the sauce that makes it Cajun, using brandy, or praline liqueur if you have that, or bourbon.

There’s nothing difficult about this cake – it makes a thick batter and your pour it into a 9×13 pan. Once baked, it’s cooled, then you pour part of the brandy sauce over it and serve a bit more on each plate. The sauce is very easy to make – you merely bring the ingredients to a boil, cool. Pour. You could make this in a bundt pan. You can halve the recipe and make one 9-inch round cake pan of it. You can double it to serve a whole lot more people. And it’s better the next day, actually.

The recipe came from Katherine Emmenegger, the executive chef at Great News, the cooking school in San Diego that my friend Cherrie and I visit with regularity. Katherine prepared a New Orleans style meal from beginning to end. I’m starting with the end since this was my favorite recipe of the bunch. Make this one, okay?

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Two years ago: Butterflied Leg of Lamb with Cherry Merlot Sauce

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Do I like chocolate, or what? Oh gosh, is this ever good. The combo of these ingredients produces a soft, silky smooth flourless chocolate cake with an orange perfume. It’s really an easy cake to make, as long as you don’t mind separating the eggs, whipping up the whites separately, and doing the springform pan with buttered parchment in it. At the cooking class with Tarla Fallgatter, she served it still slightly warm. Oh my. Heaven. I ate ever single little morsel on that serving above. Would have licked the plate of a few crumbs if I could have without embarrassing myself!

Use good bittersweet chocolate. Don’t use semisweet (it has more sugar in it and you’d have to tinker with the sugar measurement in this recipe) or any other type. Tarla used brandy, but she mentioned that she’s also made it with some espresso powder added (dissolved in 2 T. of water). Once the cake is baked, you’ll find that it sinks by nearly 50% – a LOT. You can see in the photo how high the outside edges are – it was level full when it came out of the oven. Then poof, down it went. Makes no “nevermind” though to the taste.

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A year ago: Ham Loaf
Two years ago: Cabbage Patch Stew Revisited
Three years ago: Pumpkin Praline Custard (a low-calorie dessert)

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