new month, new efforts

Do you know what the most requested recipe is of all time from the New York Times? I'm told it's the Plum Torte, developed by the cookbook author and former food columnist for the paper, Marian Burros. It's been called many things: iconic, simple, tender, cult classic, with gravitas, and utterly delicious. And I've never made it. 

I ate a lot of plums growing up in Poland. The fruit of late summer. Small plums were ubiquitous at a time when many other fruits were not. But when I moved to the States, I found the grocery store plums to be blah. Tasteless really. I rarely purchased them, never served them, and I'm not sure I ever baked with them. They just went by the wayside.

Until this year. I was, of course, flooded with mirabelles, those sweet little plums, both in Poland and France.  And I thought -- I really ought to pay attention to these fruits.  Surely there are good ones to be found at the markets? Even in the grocery store? And when the Smitten Kitchen newsletter appeared in my Inbox last week, with none other than the purple plum torte recipe -- with a slight update to the Burros one, I thought -- well now, the plum gods are telling me something. So I purchased a dozen small purple plums and announced that tonight, we'll be eating plum cake.

Ed positively balked. Why not apple cake? We have so many apples in the old orchard. And have you even used our the rhubarb this year? Soon, too, we will have an overload of peaches...  Clearly a plum skeptic. But I am determined. 

First, though, the animals. With a few plucked weeds along the way.

Then straight for the porch, on this most perfect morning. With breakfast.                  

I'm running low on granola. Baking a batch takes priority over a making a fruit dessert. 

But in the end, I do get to the plum torte, or cake, or however you might want to refer to it.

The first hing I note is that the dozen small plumbs I purchased from my grocery store? They are awful! I mean really awful! Rotting from the inside maybe. Yuk.

I wonder if the taste might improve if I submerge them in cake batter. But no, I can't risk it. It really is always a mistake to use awful ingredients.  What to do? Well, I have about five plums of varying sizes and varieties lined up on the window sill, waiting for breakfast. I can use those!

I'm saving the cake for the family dinner tonight (moved from Sunday and with a visiting guest added). Smells great!                                                                                                                            

They are here! It's been a while...

And of course, it's a porch dinner. It could be the last -- though Fall evenings are always a great unknown in Wisconsin. 

It's a very beautiful way to greet September, and my daughter's friend's visit only adds to the greatness of the moment. Ed and I are outnumbered -- in terms of the mean age, we hang way above the three young adults and of course, the three kids. And yes, they are all spirited and playful and of course, to be part of their world, even for just an evening, is simply wonderful. 

Good moods are easily shared. Here's a piece of advice -- if you feel one (good mood) coming on, go out and let others be part of it, however tangentially. They'll love you for it!

yours, with love...