The perfect recipe. Easy; smells divine; difficult to resist seconds...

As soon as I saw this recipe on the wonderful food blog 'How to cook a wolf...' I knew I was destined to cook this recipe.  Days previously I had just stripped a Victoria Plum tree and I had a fridge was full of plums waiting to be created into something wonderful, but I was looking for something suitably effortless and maximum impact. This fitted the bill. The smell of this cooking - its cinnamon scented warmth wafting through the house was divine, and I personally could not wait to reveal it from the oven, burnished and sweet, and dive in with a spoon.

This recipe is a keeper and I hope you decide to try it. When I make it again I might put a few more plums in. I was perhaps a little stingy with the plums first time around and my plums did disappear from view once the sponge enveloped them. This isn't a bad thing by the way, but it arguably did lose the visual impact when cooked.

Original Plum Torte

adapted from the NYTimes recipe and from the wonderful food blog, 'How to cook a wolf.'

Total time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Ingredients

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup unsalted butter

1 cup plain flour, sifted

1 teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt

2 large eggs

24 halves pitted Italian purple plums (prune plums) I used victoria plums.

Sugar and cinnamon for topping.

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Cream sugar and butter in a bowl. Add flour, baking powder, salt and eggs, and beat well.

3. Spoon the batter into a buttered spring form of 8 or 9 inches. Place the plum halves skin side up on top of the batter. Sprinkle lightly with sugar, depending on the sweetness of the fruit. Sprinkle with about 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, or to taste.

4. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes. Remove and cool; refrigerate or freeze if desired (but first, double-wrap the tortes in foil, place in a plastic bag, and seal). Or cool to lukewarm, and serve.

5. To serve a torte that has been frozen, defrost and reheat it briefly at 300 degrees.

Yield: 8 servings.

This is glorious, served warm with vanilla ice cream. Pudding heaven.

Whilst I'm here, let me recommend the blog from where I was inspired. 'How to cook a wolf' You'll see a link on the left hand side of this page. You must visit!