Mirabelle plums are one of my favorite fruits, but they are actually quite difficult to come by in the US. They are very small (in some cases, not much larger than a cherry) and have a fairly short shelf life. They are also a trademark yellow. I made do this time by finding similar small plum (a little smaller than a golf ball) but I had some mirabelle jam, which I put under the fresh plums on these crumble bars. They are quite juicy, a little tart and very yummy.
I am calling this creation a “Olive Oil, Almond and Sweet Plum Cake” but what it actually is is what happens when you take two of Joanne Chang’s Recipes from Flour Love — the Plum Frangipane Tart (page 230) and the Olive Oil Cake with Fresh Grapes (page 297) and combine them. Turns out, it’s pretty spectacular as a combination — it’s mostly the Olive Oil Cake recipes, but instead of grapes, I used tiny sweet plums. I’m guessing it would also work really well with cherries (pitted) or gooseberries as well. At any rate, glorious inspiration for an otherwise unforgettable Monday.
So, these cookies are a little out of character for me: for starters, they are bigger, like the size of my hand. That is unusual for me as I prefer smaller cookies. And second, they use artificial colors in the sugar, which I do once in a blue moon. But back in late June, i made some fantastic strawberry jam, and then in mid-July, I found a strawberry shaped cookie cutter, so I knew that these cookies needed to me. They are actually quite yummy, with just a hint of almond in the cookie itself. And the homemade jam is great too.
Sometimes, your lunch is just so good that you want to share it with the entire world, like today. This is what happens when the garden gives you an overload of fruits (cherry tomatoes are fruits, right?); the thyme is from the garden too. This was amazingly delicious and even the pix came out better than usual. Not bad for a Friday!
This is, hands down, my new favorite bread. It’s another one of those (almost) no knead, bake-in-a-dutch-oven kind and it turned out perfect. It uses a King Arthur Harvest Grains blend (can he found here; a one bag of these grains is enough for 8 or 9 loaves). It adds a delicious nuttiness. Simply wonderful. And it looks darn right pretty.