Plum Shortcakes

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A good bakery is a wonderous thing. You’ll quite often find me, nose pressed against the glass, eyeballs widened, and probably just the hint of drool coming from the side of my mouth. I don’t usually go in, I don’t need to. I like just looking. Seeing what’s on offer, how they have presented different things, and getting ideas for my own baking efforts.

Many moons ago, I lived for awhile in Germany. Twice a week I would head off, cold crisp air on my cheeks. Hands wedged into pockets and music wedged into ears, I would set forth on my two buses to get to a German language class. I loved this time. I loved the German winter, I loved the alone time, I loved being in a different country, I loved learning the language… and I really loved stopping off at a bakery afterwards.

Germany bakeries are a thing of wonderous beauty. So many different types of wonderful breads, and enough sweet goodies for a young Australian gal to do more than a little drooling. Everything I ever ate was delicious. Really delicious. Sure I probably headed for the same kind of things time and time again, but when you are on to a good thing, why stop eh?

So what did I go for? Anthing vaguely fruity/ sour related. Cherry strudel? You betcha. Plum struesel? Yes indeed. They all had my name well and truly written all over them.

So with a German bakery in mind, Plum Shortcakes it was.

Fruity, not crazy sweet, but enough of sugar kick just to say … ja bitte, das ist lecker.

Plum Shortcakes

200g plain flour

100g self raising flour

150g softened butter

150g sugar

2 tsps vanilla

zest of one lemon

2 beaten eggs

plums

Cream the butter and sugar together, add vanilla, eggs and lemon zest. Then fold through flour. Into your tray/s and add halved plums. Bake at 180C until risen, slightly golden, and smells like you can’t wait to eat it any longer (cooking time will depend on the tray you use.)

42 thoughts on “Plum Shortcakes”

  4. i love it when the juice from the plums seeps into the buttery cake like yours has..it looks so good..german baking is pretty darned good..and lucky you for living there and being able to sample the genuine article..x

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  5. OH YUM – they look divine! I’ve got a friend coming to lunch on Saturday so I think I’ll attempt these for dessert. (Can you please give me a teensy bit more guidance re approximate cooking times? I’d hate to burn them! And should I use fresh plums or would preserved plums work? Thanks so much Brydie).

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    • Keri I think fresh plums would be better, hold their form a little easier, and contrast the flavour with the tartness to the sugar… saying that, that’s just catering to my tastebuds. If you can find some preserved plums in juice rather than syrup that might work… or fresh blueberries, nectarines, apricots also should work…. Just play 🙂

      (and for the cooking times, I would start peeking from 25 minutes on. I made these in rectangular individual cake pans, but one whole tray would work just as well.)

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      • Thanks Brydie – you’re always so helpful : ) I’ll let you know how they turn out. I’ve got little individual (round) pie tins so I thought I’d use them. I’ll be happy if they look half as good as yours!

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  8. I had to learn German at school and I was hopeless at it. But I think if I was put in the environment you were in, I could make it work. That’s a beautiful looking plum cake and with plums being in such abundance at the moment it makes so much sense to be cooking with them xx

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  9. Totally agree with that taste sensation Brydie, and this recipe looks and sounds very tasty. As a matter of fact I’ve just made, last night, a slice that sounds quite similar, but I spread some steamed plums over the top and then sprinkled a mix of rapadura sugar and coconut over that. The plums were badly in need of rescuing/having something done to them, before nothing could be done to them! :))
    So I cut them up and steamed them. When I found this particular recipe, I knew these would work well instead of the whole fruit. Just the right amount of fruity/tart/sweet. Yum!
    Hope you don’t leave too much drool on the bakery windows! ;D x

    p.s. has something changed here, coz I’m having to log in to wordpress to leave my comment? Very odd.

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  12. Your bakery window gazing sounds rather like my picture gazing when you post images and recipes like these…except I would definitely enter and make a purchase if only the computer screen would allow me 🙂 These are beautiful looking shortcakes.

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  13. These look fabulous and just the thing for this weekends baking as my tree if dripping plums. Those German bakeries are a sight to behold! We were once deep in the vast emptiness of Namibia and we came upon a tiny town with the biggest German bakery I’ve ever seen. There were 32 huge cakes and the cafe part was full of people. I think the whole population of that town was there eating cake!
    Love you blog.

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  16. Firstly, I can’t believe all the blogging you’ve done with a brand new little bub. How wonderful to see you resume doing the things you like? As I sit here marveling at your ability to cope with two small children and a newborn, I’m reminded of myself. When I brought home my third bub, Nicole, it was to a garage actually as we were building the house. It could of been worse as in baby no two’s case – we brought him home to a leaky caravan. What a nightmare!

    I digress. The point I wanted to make was that here I had become a mother for the third time and off I went teaching myself how to sew. I was addicted. I figured I would make things small for the kids and if they didn’t work out, then it wouldn’t matter because I won’t have used much fabric. Well they did work out and off I went. I was a total lunatic; all this work, not enough sleep, trying to cook and clean in the garage all the while sewing every spare second I could. It was wonderful. What a time. I’m enjoying thinking about it. I’m sure you’re savouring every moment in life too.

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    • I wanted to see if the comment would work before going on.
      Secondly, you lived in Germany? Wow. Where? My mother came from Dusseldorf and Mitchell’s best friend lives in Stuttgart. When I went there three years ago, it was simply breathtaking. I loved Germany and spent no where near enough time there. Mitch said Heidelberg was stunning and he loved Bavaria and all the Black Forest region.
      And I thoroughly agree: the bakeries there are amazing. I took photos of the famous German Plum Cake. Do you recall seeing them in the shops over there – massive round baking tins – one cake would take up half the space in one window. They were enormous. So fascinating.

      Thirdly, I made something very similar to your recipe today. Instead of plums, I used canned cherries. I also grated an apple and whipped together a vanilla buttercake mixture. Together with some warm home made custard, it was the perfect afternoon tea on this rainy, almost wintry day on the gold coast. All I can say is, great minds think alike.

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      • Trust me Mariana, there is a good degree of utter chaos with the 3! Blogging is good as I can still do it one handed, two fingered typing style although at a much slower pace than what I was doing.
        Germany, I was in a little town called Wuppertal, pretty close to your mother’s home town of Dusseldorf, which is actually where I had my language classes 🙂
        And your recipe?… delicious!

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  17. lovely in its simplicity. and it does look scrumptious… never been to Germany, but they do seem to know one or two things about baking 🙂

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  18. Ahh I see! Sorry Brydie I hadn’t seen that when commenting. Plum forgot to look around to see if there was an explanation! 😀 Get it??!! plum forgot! I know pretty weak joke…..sigh

    Yes I often wonder why things that work often have to be fixed!!!

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  19. I love the whole fresh plums in your bakery delight. I have never been to a German bakery but maybe it is a good thing to just stand outside as going in could be deadly… or at least not good for our hips. Take care, BAM

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  22. Goodness me, these look amazing!! I lived in Germany too as you might know and eating food from their bakeries was heaven on a stick. And the cause of a whopping 12kg weight gain 🙂 Actually my favourite was a plum thing with quark and a sugary crumble on top – quark is hard to get here but there is one german bakery in Hobart that does amazing quark things. I WILL definitely make this and let you know how it goes. Have a great weekend xx

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