Gabi and Winter Plum Cake

I was inspired by Niki making this cake some time ago, and waited till I could get the brown icing sugar for this cake before I made it.

Winter Plum Cake (How To Be A Domestic Goddess - Nigella Lawson)

575g tin of red plums - I can't find them so I used the approximately same amount from a 1 kilogram bottle of Goulbourn Valley red plums
125 grams self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
75 grams ground almonds
125 grams butter, softened
125 grams light brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 scant teaspoon almond essence

20 cm Springform cake tin.

For the icing:160 grams unrefined icing sugar1-2 tablespoons hot water

Preheat oven to 170 c (mine is very hot so I had used about 150).

Line and grease the cake tin. I am so lazy when it comes to this part I have taken to spraying the sides with canola oil and it works just as well!

Drain the plums, remove the stones and broke them up in the process and leave in a sieve to drain.

Mix the flour, baking powder and ground almonds.

Cream the butter and sugar, then beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a tablespoon of the flour mixture after each one.

Beat in the almond essence ( I think the essence is optional) then fold in the rest of the flour mixture and the drained, chopped plums. Turn into the prepared tin and bake for about 1 - 1 1/4 hours ( I only went to 45 mins its this super hot oven of mine!).

Remove from oven, cool in its tin for about 10 minutes, then turn onto the rack.

When cool, ice with brown-sugar icing. Mix the sieved icing sugar with water till you have a caramel-coloured shiny paste. A word about this icing sugar, Nigella says that no other icing sugar works so I took her at her word and refused to make it prior and I think it was well worth the wait.

Pour over the top of the cake to cover thinly, and leave to drip down the sides - I couldn't resist using some gold cachous also purchased at the Essential Ingredient in Melbourne. I found some gold ones at a store here but they were so expensive I gave them a miss.

I also added some dried rose petals (dare I say also obtained in Melbourne at the Essential Ingredient). When I took this cake to work recently it had a distinctly Middle Eastern flavour due to the almonds and rose petals which worked quite well.