Dark Chocolate Fresh Plum Wholewheat Meringue Tray Bake … so good!

“Some of us come on earth seeing.
Some of us come on earth seeing color.”
Louise Nevelson

Dark Chocolate Fresh Plum Wholewheat Meringue Tray Bake … a bake that ended my bout of lack of inspiration. The heat and humidity is killing. Back from Leh, an exhausting trip that was messed up by the travel agent, didn’t seem to make life better. It was a trip I had waited for forever … then came the mail a few hours before we were due to leave about an error in bookings their end! Try that at 11000ft, tired teens, rarefied oxygen levels …. just didn’t work!

The past few months have seen my nose to the grinding stone, trying to make up for lost time. A project to be completed, the daughter to be packed off to uni, loads of emails in the things to do, a few small things in the pipeline … and then the everyday meals, laundry, grocery, dog etc. Of course hungry teens at home for summer vacation didn’t seem to make life easier.

This was a few days before she left. They were hungry yet again. There is this time in the afternoon between 3 and 4 that some hunger goblins visit our home. I wish I could turn invisible at 3 o clock! Really do. Those goblins have surfaced without fail for the past month. I decided to beat them to it.

I had plums in the fridge… and thoughts of a whole wheat fresh plum cake I had made last year! It was time to work on those lines. A last minute thought made me save some whipped egg whites for the top; wanted to make a visually fun cake. Little did I know that when it would bake, it would endlessly remind me of our trip to Leh. Why? Nothing could have prepared us for what we saw when we landed in Leh. To our mind, we were going into the mountains, at 11000 feet, the majestic Himalayas which would be GREEN and snow topped. 11000ft to me meant more snow that would exceed any we had seen when we visited Srinagar, Kashmir in March. Boy were we gob smacked. I think we didn’t realise that Leh is a cold dessert. I could’ve never imagined those endless mountains of mud, rock and BROWN! Very National Geographic, very awe inspiring, very unlike what we expected. That’s not to say the view wasn’t stunning. It certainly was. Still this cake reminded me so much of the vast rocky terrain. Mountains higher than one can imagine, and all made of mud, rocks, actually HUGE boulders, and in many places not a spot of vegetation…

… until we reached where we were booked to stay. On the way to the beautiful Nimmu House, which we eventually got to after the travel agent messed up our bookings, we even saw something like a Grand Canyon. Nature never fails to astound!

Such a vast terrain, never ending mountains, beautiful wooden gates, doors I could pack and run away with, windows too.Rustic outdoors that left you wanting for more, more than the eyes could capture. Fresh mountain air as clean and crisp as could be. The landscape was unreal at times, took my breath away …. yet left me with ‘brown’ stamped in my mind.

And then the tray bake happened, just on the go. One look at it and it was an uncanny feeling. It reminded me of the Leh landscape in so many ways. Unexpected, rustically beautiful {in my eyes}, with unusual tones the brown sugar meringue picked up with the dark chocolate melting into it.

One bite later and it was pure joy. Moist, deeply chocolaty, delightful plum undertones, what a fun bake this tuned out to be. Must have been the plums that created some berry like magic in there.

There’s still some summer left here in the plains you are enamoured by stone fruit like me. Go grab some plums and begin experimenting. You never know how yummy life might get! Plums, peaches and cherries will soon be gone, and I will sadly miss them. We are looking at a long extended hot season though…sadly, the rains have failed to show up!

Have you ever made a cake inspired by landscape or a vacation? Would love to hear about it!

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Recipe: Dark Chocolate Fresh Plum Wholewheat Meringue Tray Bake Summary: Dark Chocolate Fresh Plum Wholewheat Meringue Tray Bake. One bite later and it was pure joy. Moist, deeply chocolaty, delightful plum undertones, what a fun bake this tuned out to be. Must have been the plums that created some berry like magic in there.Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
Ingredients:

• 100g butter
• 185g brown sugar {divided 100g+85g}
• 3 small eggs, separated
• 100g dark chocolate, room temperature
• 185g plum puree {about 4 medium pitted plums, with skin}
• 75g whole wheat flour
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• pinch salt
• 40g cocoa powder
  
• vanilla extract
• 50g dark chocolate chips for topping

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180C. Line an 8″ square baking tin with parchment.
2. Beat egg whites with pinch of cream of tartar to soft peaks. Add 100g sugar a tbsp at a time and continue to beat to stiff peaks. Reserve.
3. Place chocolate in a heatproof bowl. Microwave for a minute until chocolate melts. Whisk well, add the plum puree, whisk. Then add yolks, whisk again. Add vanilla extract and cocoa and whisk until smooth. Reserve.
4. Beat butter with remaining 85g sugar for 2-3 minutes, until smooth
5. Mix in the flour and baking soda, followed by the chocolate mix.
6. Gently fold in the whipped whites, reserving about 1/2-3/4 cup for the topping.
7. Pour batter into prepared tin. Sprinkle over with chocolate chips.
8. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until the tester comes out with a few moist crumbs. Tent the top with a sheet of aluminum foil if over browning.
9. Place on cooling rack and leave to cool in tin for about 30 minutes.
10. Gently turn out of tin. Slice and serve.

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