Simple Fresh Plum Cake without Rum

This simple plum coffee cake is so easy to make you will make on repeat all summer long. It is a one bowl recipe, made with simple pantry ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, flour, eggs, baking powder, salt), fresh purple plums and sprinkled with brown sugar. This recipe is made without rum, but you can easily add it in if you prefer your cakes a little spiced up. This is the best and the only plum cake recipe you will ever need. If you like fruit cake you might also enjoy this apple yogurt cake or this raspberry Bundt cake.

Ingredient notes

• Fresh plums: You can use either purple plums or regular ones to make this plum cake. If you use the latter make sure you choose smaller size plums. Frozen plums will make this cake too soggy; I advise against using them.
• Brown sugar: to sprinkle on top of this coffee cake to help caramelize and give it a little crunch.
• Granulated sugar: this recipe uses regular sugar; however, you can replace it with brown sugar if you prefer.
• Unsalted butter: use full fat butter. Soften the butter before starting the recipe by leaving it out at room temperature for 30 minutes. If its cold, use the microwave at 5 seconds intervals to soften the butter.

What cake pan to use for this recipe

You can use:

• A 20 cm round springform cake pan
• A 20 cm cake ring. In this case place the ring on top of a baking tray lined with parchment paper.

In both cases, you must butter the pan/ring (or use baking spray) and then cover with granulated sugar. This will absorb the moisture of the plums and help create a crunchier base.

How To Make this recipe step by step

It is very straightforward; you only need one bowl and 20 minutes:

• Prepare a 20 cm round cake pan. Butter it and cover with sugar.
• Halve the plums and remove the pits (you can also slice them as shown in the photos).
• Cream the sugar and the butter using a whisk (or electric mixer if you have one) until the mixture has become fluffy and pale yellow.
• Add the eggs one at a time and mix until combined. Don't worry if when you add the eggs it looks like the batter breaks apart, just keep whisking and it will come together just fine.
• Add the sifted dry ingredients (salt, flour and baking powder) in two times and mix until combined.
• Then transfer the batter onto your cake pan and spread it evenly using an off-set spatula or the back of a spoon.
• Cover the batter with the previously halved and thinly sliced plums. You should put them with the skin side up. And press them in gently. Don't be afraid to fill your pan with plums. If there are not enough plums, the batter will rise in the oven and cover the plums completely.
• Sprinkle the top with brown sugar.

Recipe notes

• If there aren't enough plums, the batter will rise in the oven and cover the plums completely.
• If you use a smaller size cake pan: you will have too much batter in proportion to the cake pan and the cake will also cover the plums once baked. In that case you should halve the recipe or make 2 smaller cakes.

Baking Tips

• Bake at 180 degrees Celsius until golden brown. About 40 minutes.
• Each oven is different so don't trust the timer, always check before! You can do this by inserting a knife or a toothpick or a skewer at the centre of the cake (make sure to avoid the plums). If it comes out dry, then the plum torte is ready.

Storing tips

This super moist cake is even better as the days go by! It keeps perfectly for 3 to 4 days. If you manage to make it last that long!

Freezing tips

This cake is better eaten fresh. I do not recommend freezing it. It is so easy and quick to make it is not worth freezing.

Variations for this recipe

• Bake at 180 degrees Celsius until golden brown. About 40 minutes.
• Each oven is different so don't trust the timer, always check before! You can do this by inserting a knife or a toothpick or a skewer at the centre of the cake (make sure to avoid the plums). If it comes out dry, then the plum torte is ready.

• You can add 1 scrapped vanilla bean to the batter. If you do add it in at the very beginning with the butter and sugar. You can watch how to scrape a vanilla bean here.
• You can add rum to this fruit cake to spice it up a little. If you do, you should mix it in at the very end, once the batter is ready. Use 10 ml of rum.
• You can also cover this cake with crumble topping. You can find a great recipe here Apricot Tart.