Plum and blueberry yoghurt cake

I  like fresh fruit in cake. I don't mean cakes decorated with fruit as in a black forest gateau but fresh fruit chopped up and mixed in a batter and baked. As in an apple cake, a peach cake or even a pineapple upside down cake.

A few weeks ago, blueberries hit the markets. Now, fresh blueberries in Chennai markets are as common as snow in the Sahara- it's never happened (or maybe just once!). The lot I bought was used to make muffins but while the muffins tasted nice, I thought it would have been better to eat the berries on their own or as part of a fruit salad.

I've been hoarding some dried wild blueberries from a recent trip abroad and have been wanting to bake them along with some purple plums sitting in my fruit tray. So the hunt for a cake recipe started. Since the plums were tart, I wanted a batter which would be sweet enough to counteract the acidity of the fruit. Finally I settled on a recipe from smittenkitchen.com.

Juicy purple plums

Plums and dried wild blueberries

I halved the plums and chopped them in 1/2 " dices,

Tart overdose with  the addition of limes

used only the grated rind of the limes.

Plum and blueberry yoghurt loaf

After baking, the original recipe asks for 1/3 cup of lemon juice to be boiled with a tablespoon of sugar. I made a syrup with 50 gm sugar and 60 ml rum which was then spooned over the loaf.

Moist plum and blueberry yoghurt cake

There were a few changes I made to the original recipe, among them using melted and cooled butter instead of oil, increasing the vanilla extract to 1 teaspoon. Also, adding 1/4 cup dried blueberries and 1 1/2 cups of chopped plums instead of blueberries as in the original recipe.

Plum and blueberry yoghurt cake

Ingredients
200 gm flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 eggs
1 cup yoghurt
220 gm sugar
Grated zest of 2 limes
1 tsp vanilla extract
110 gm melted and cooled butter
1/4 cup dried blueberries (can substitute with currants)
1 1/2 cups diced plums

Syrup
2 tbsp water
50 gm sugar
60 ml rum

Method
Grease and base line an 8 1/2"x 4 1/2" loaf pan.
Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl, keep aside.
Break the eggs into another bowl, beat them well then beat in the yoghurt, sugar, zest, vanilla extract and the butter.
Keep aside 2 tbsp of the flour mix and then fold in the rest into the egg and yoghurt mixture.
Sprinkle the remaining flour over the plums and blueberries, stir gently to coat.
Fold them lightly through the batter.
Transfer the batter into the prepared pan, bake in a preheated 170°C oven for about 45 minutes.

For the syrup, place water and sugar in a saucepan and bring to boil.
When all the sugar has dissolved, turn off the flame and add the rum.

When the cake is baked, turn it out carefully onto a wire rack.
Place a plate underneath the rack and spoon the syrup all over the top.

It was a delicious, moist cake. The rum gave it a bit of a kick. It was even better the next day, warmed up a little and served with ice cream. Next time, I would like to make it a plain cake without even the syrup.

And bake the plums in a tart.