Mixed marriages: apricots and plums: apriums

Fruit is promiscuous. There, I've said it. And you probably haven't a clue what I mean. Well, good. That means you'll keep on reading.

For all the talk of genetically engineered food, and mixing genomes of different plants, the fact is, this has been going on forever, and it will continue to do so. If you talk to anyone who is a professional citrus farmer (like my friend Eric), they will tell you about how a cross of a lemon and tangelo made one thing, while a cross of a grapefruit and an orange made another thing, etc, etc, etc. Sometimes, these crosses are "by design," i.e, someone basically takes a paintbrush, gets the pollen off of a flower from one species and puts it on the pistil of the flower of another species, and then you wait to see what happens. I'm oversimplifying here, but that is, basically what happens. It's how the skazillion types of lillies we use as cut flowers came about, and it's how a lot of other things did, too.

Some years ago, when the government actually thought nutrition was important, funding for agricultural research was a lot easier to get. And the money went to some interesting projects. One of the most interesting ones to me was work, done in California, to investigate crosses between various stone fruits. Apricots and plums were crossed, and recrossed, and back crossed, and so forth. From that work, three distinct new varieties emerged. And their names reflect their parentage: apriums, plumcots, and pluots.

Pluots are probably the best known of the three. If you've seen a round purple fruit in a supermarket that looks like a plum, with the label "dinosaur egg" on it, you're looking at a pluot. There are many varieties of these guys, with names like "dappled dandy" and "flavor king" and "flavor queen," etc. They are late season fruit, just like plums. Probably because plums are sturdier, and handle shipping better, so , too, do pluots, and that's why you'll see them more often than others. I will revisit pluots when I'm cooking with them. They're worth getting to know.

Plumcots and apriums, are harder to find. As they are closer to apricots than plums, they are softer, and don't travel very well. There are a few farmers in NY who grow plumcots, which have a soft, sweet texture to me, and taste first of apricots, and then have a follow through flavor of plum. I've never seen a local aprium. These are so close to apricots that some farm stands actually call them apricots so as not to confuse customers. Interestingly, although they are crossed with plums, which ripen late, they actually ripen before apricots do. And we brought a bunch of them home with us from California, as we both wait, eagerly for apricots to make their all too brief appearance.

If you are fortunate enough to find apriums, savor them. And if you happen to find them and apricots at the same time, have a taste comparison. See if you can tell the differences. But if "all" you have are apriums, use them where you would apricots. Like in the recipe that follows.

There is a very brief period in the season when apricots and cherries are both at their peak. That's the time for mixed fruit cobblers, plates of apricot sherbet and cherry ice cream, or vice versa, bicolored galettes, and all kinds of fun things. Sometimes, I try to extend this season by freezing some of both. I never freeze enough. When they are both at your hand, however, make the cake that follows.

Annalena considers this a "fancy cake." What does she mean by that? Well, to Annalena, a "fancy cake" is one you would never make for yourself, and actually would not serve as dessert at the end of a multicourse dinner, but if you had people coming over for an afternoon, or wanted to have a nice brunch, this is a cake to make. It's a bit on the complicated side, but it's not that bad. It's an adaptation of a recipe from one of the cookbooks published by Greens restaurant, Deborah Madison's indispensable "The Savory Way."

Ms. Madison's recipe "gilds the lilly" by stuffing her apricot halves with almond paste. I've done this and honestly did not see the point. It just made a sweet cake even sweeter. And as it is an upside down cake, it's pretty sweet. Also, she halves and pits her cherries. I think of my "audience." If I can safely tell them "watch for pits" I don't bother. To me, cherry pits do add a little extra almond flavor on their own. But if you are serving this to children, men , or other species who don't listen, (I exaggerate, but not too much), you may want to avoid personal liability by pitting the cherries.

Ms. Madison also uses a cast iron skillet. That's perfect for upside down cake BAKING. Trying to unmold a hot cake, in a hot, heavy cast iron skillet can be difficult, and you can get burned (trust me on this). So I use a regular, 9 or 10 inch cake pan with high sides. You can heat them on the top of the stove, it's not dangerous to the pan if it's well made. Okay, here we go.

You'll need apriums or apricots, and these you should cut in half. How many? Good question. How big are your apriums? I would say you will need somewhere between 10 and 15 of them. You'll also need about that number of cherries. You'll be able to squeeze more of them in, if you like. Have them ready.

Preheat your oven to 375. Then, on your stove top, melt 1 stick of unsalted butter with 3/4 cup of brown sugar. Watch how it bubbles and looks like caramel, and smells like "dessert." When the sugar melts, take the pan off the heat (wear a mitt), and put it on a heat proof surface . Swirl the pan if the sugar isn't evenly distributed. Then put your halved apriums, cut side up, right on the caramel. Do this on the outside of the pan first, and move in. Then add your cherries. If it looks like you've got gaps (the fruit is going to shrink in the baking), add some more.

Make your batter, by mixing a half stick of softened butter with a half cup of white sugar, until it's light and fluffy. You'll need some arm action here, or a good, strong mixer. You're looking for the sugar and butter to almost turn white in color. Then beat in three large eggs, one at a time. Deborah then adds a half teaspoon each of almond extract and vanilla. I stick with a full teaspoon of vanilla. It's your call here.

Stop the mixer, and then combine 1.24 cups of white, unbleached flour, a teaspoon of baking powder, and a quarter teaspoon of baking soda and salt. You also will need half a cup of buttermilk, sour cream, or yogurt, whatever you have on hand. Add about 1/3 of the flour and mix it with the butter, then stir in 1/3 of the dairy. Keep on repeating this, and stir it until it's just combined.

Pour this over the fruit. Get a spatula and spread it out, and don't worry too much if it looks uneven. Baking smooths out a a lot of things. Put it in the hot oven, and bake it for about 40 minutes. Be careful about that timing. I have had this cake finish on me in 30 minutes, and also take a full hour and a quarter. How can you tell? Two ways. First, look at the surface: is it nice and golden brown and tasty looking? If it does, get a toothpick or a straw and insert it in the center. Do you get dry crumbs? If you do, it's done. If you get wet batter, bake it longer.

When it's done, take the cake out carefully, and now do something you haven't done yet: look for a plate bigger than your pan. If you used a 9 inch pan, get something that's about 11 inches across (that's a standard American dinner plate). If you used a 10 inch pan (which you can), you'll need a serving platter kind of thing. Run a knife around the perimeter of the cake, after it's cooled for about ten minutes. Now, you have to be brave and gutsy. Put that plate over the pan, so that the pan is centered. Slide everything so that your protected hand is in the middle of the pan. Put your other hand firmly on the top of the plate and then, quickly and decisively, turn it over. The cake will "plop" into the plate. Some of the fruit will stick. It always does. Pull it out and put it where it belongs. It's usually pretty clear what goes where.

This is a cake that doesn't keep real well, so you should plan on eating it the day you make it. It's really good warm, but I like it cold , i.e., at room temperature , even better. If you DO have leftovers, refrigerate them, and try something like warming the pieces in the oven the next day, maybe with some cream over them.

Once you have this recipe in hand, you can play with it. For example, remember those pluots? Well, later in the season, make this with pluots and late season blueberries or even blackberries for a dramatic looking one. In the fall or winter, do it with apples or pears and cranberries. As you change the fruit, change the flavoring too. I love using candied ginger in the plum/pluot version, and orange flavoring in the apple one. For pears, I toss in a teaspoon of cinammon.

Really, if you get the technique of making the caramel, and the batter under control, the fruit is something you can play with. In the winter, you might try using d ried apricots and dried cherries. Hmmmm. If I do say so myself, that's brilliant.