This cake is a Bavarian specialty. The very original Bavarian Plumb Cake or Zwetschgendatschi is from Augsburg. A “Datschi” is a plum cake where the plumbs get pressed into the dough, which comes from the word datschen or detschen respectively.
This cake is a great one, for any Sunday afternoon. It takes about 75 minutes (including time for the dough to rise)
The amount is for a baking tray of 41,5 x 27cm or 16 x 10.5in
For the Bavarian Plum Cake you need
- 350g / 12oz. flour
- ½ a cube fresh baker’s yeast 20g or 2 packages (=14g) of dry yeast
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1/8 liter / 0.5 cup handwarm milk
- 1 pinch of salt
- 50g / 1.5oz. melted butter
- 80g / 3oz. sugar
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- about 1.5kg / 3.5lbs damson plums
For the “streusel” take
- 300g / 10.5oz. flour
- 280g / 10oz. sugar
- 1 tbsp vanilla sugar
- 200g / 7oz. cold butter
- For the start, put flour in a bowl, make a well and crumble the yeast in the well.
- Heat up the milk to about 40-45°C (105-110°F)
- Now distribute the tea spoon sugar and the warm milk on top and let it sit until it gets foamy (about 5-10 minutes). In order for the yeast to feel comfortable, put a towel on top of the bowl and place it at a warm spot.
- While the yeast is working, wash the plums and dry them.
- Now mix the pre-dough with the flour, the remaining milk, sugar, the melted butter and the salt and let the dough knead for about 5 minutes until it forms a soft sticky dough. If the mixture is too wet after kneading, add more flour 1 tbsp at a time until a soft but sticky dough forms.
- Roll out on baking tray using a floured rolling pin. Along the sides of the baking tray form a border, if you like. While baking, some of the yeast dough will rise automatically, to form a boarder.
- Again at a warm spot covered with a towel, allow the dough to rise for another 30 minutes at least. Even if your dough doesn’t rise at all, don’t worry, it will be super delicious, as there are more plums to taste than yeast dough.
- Pre-heat the oven to about 180°C (360°F)
- Now pit the plums and cut into ¼s.
- When the dough has risen to about double the initial size, place the plums on top, like roof shingles, so as to cover the dough completely.
- Now prepare the streusel, by mixing all ingredients together. If the streusel don’t form well enough, add more butter. If you’d like a cake with less calories only mix a tsp sugar and 2 tsp cinnamon and sprinkle over the plums.
- Place the baking tray in the middle of the oven and let it bake for about 35 minutes, it is ready, when it looks like this: It is perfect with some whipped cream that melts on top of the hot cake. Either as desert or as Sunday afternoon cake, highly recommendable! Choose wisely as to whether you’d like to eat the Zwetschgendatschi warm or cold, because after the first piece you might not be able to stop…
