Kitchen Wench

Tonight’s menu, courtesy of moi:

• Garlic Herb Lamb Chops with Mint Jelly, modified slightly from this recipe in Bon Appetit. I used Herbs de Provence instead of rosemary and pan seared and then oven roasted the chops, rather than broiling. Oh, and I used about 4x as much garlic, which was totally worth it because it cooks up crispy and delicious in the pan drippings.


• Sour Cream and Chive Mashed Red Potatoes. Roughly, 1.75 lb red potatoes, 2 tbsp butter, 4 tbsp light sour cream, and 1 tbsp chopped fresh chives, plus salt and pepper to taste.
• Romaine Salad with homemade Green Goddess yogurt dressing using an herb base from Penzey’s Spices.
• Warm Plum Torte with a dollop of whipped cream.

After biting into his lamb chop, my dad proclaimed, “Well, Alicia, you are going to make some guy very fat someday.” Personally, I advocate portion control, not flavor control.

My version is modified slightly from the original recipe, which appeared in the New York Times and in the Cooking for Comfort cookbook. This torte is incredibly easy to make, not too sweet, and is a great way to use up extra or overripe fruit. The original recipe called for Italian prune plums, but I used little red plums instead and it worked out just beautifully. This torte would also be great using other stone fruit, such as peaches or cherries, and it would be easy to add a different flavoring or liquer to the cake for endless possibilities.

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup PLUS 2 tablespoons sugar
• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour, sifted
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• Pinch salt
• 24 halves pitted small plums OR 6 regular plums, sliced
• 1 -2 teaspoons ground cinnamon (depending on your taste)

Directions

1. Arrange a rack in the lower third of the oven. Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2. Grease the bottom and sides of a 9-10 inch springform pan. (If you don’t have a springform, a regular baking pan would probably be fine, but you wouldn’t be able to unmold and present it as nicely.)
3. In an electric mixer, cream the 3/4 cup sugar and butter. Add eggs and vanilla, then the flour, baking powder, and salt and beat to mix well. Batter will be quite thick. Spread into greased pan.
4. Mix remaining sugar and cinnamon. Sprinkle half of the cinnamon sugar over the top of the batter. Then cover with the plums, skin side down. Don’t worry about overlapping, as the fruit will shrink as it bakes. Sprinkle the plums with the remaining cinnamon sugar.
5. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes, until the center tests done with a toothpick. Remove and cool to room temperature or serve warm. Serve plain or with vanilla ice cream.

Makes 8 servings.

Storage Note: The torte may be refrigerated or frozen for several months, well wrapped. To serve, return to room temperature and reheat at 300°F until warm.