Prune Cake

Ingredients

FOR THE CAKE:

     1 ½ cups Prunes

     1 cup Sugar

     3 Eggs

     1 cup Oil

     1-½ cup Flour, Sifted

     1 Teaspoon Baking Soda

     ¼ teaspoon sale

     1 tablespoon Nutmeg

     1 tablespoon Allspice

     1 tablespoon Cinnamon

     1 cup Buttermilk

     1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

     1 cup chopped walnuts

FOR THE ICING:

     1 cup Sugar

     ½ cups Buttermilk

     ½ teaspoons Baking Soda

     1 Tablespoon White Corn Syrup

     ¼ cups Butter

     ½ teaspoons Vanilla

Preparation Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cover prunes with water. Bring to a boil and cook until soft and mashable, about eight minutes. Remove from heat, drain water, and mash on a plate. Set aside.

Mix together oil, sugar, and eggs. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients. Combine wet and dry ingredients, add buttermilk and vanilla and stir gently until just combined. Throw in the prunes and walnuts and stir gently to combine. DO NOT OVERMIX!

Pour batter into buttered springform tube pan and bake for 1 hour. DO NOT OVERBAKE

While cake has five minutes remaining, make the icing:

Combine all icing ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat and bring to a slow boil. Boil without stirring for 5 to 7 minutes, or until icing starts to turn dark. Do NOT allow icing to reach soft ball stage; icing should be caramel in color, but not sticky like caramel. Icing should be easily pourable.

Remove cake from oven and pour on icing immediately.

Let stand overnight. Serve warm.








Adapted from a recipe in Noteworthy: A collection of recipes from the Ravinia Festival