German Pflaumenkuchen (Plum cake), Poached Plums And My New Website

I've been thinking a lot about balance recently.  

It started when I read the first chapter of Eat, Pray, Love. This book has been on my reading list for so long now, and I finally started reading it a couple of weeks ago. It's one of those books to be savoured because it's written so simply and beautifully that it makes me want to read it really slowly, hoping it will never end. But at the same time, I would love to read it as fast as possible because it's so enjoyable. It mainly deals with the issue of finding balance in ones life and it got me thinking about how unbalanced my life is and how I need to start changing that.  

 The interwebz also seems to be full of posts surrounding this theme as I discovered in my reader last week, almost like a collective subconscious moving towards the ideal way of life: Leo's (very brief but succinct) a brief guide to life and letting go of fake needs, Sarah's on the importance of having space, and a CNN article, be polite and put your smartphone down.   

 It also made me think about you, dear reader: how balanced is your life? And if it is quite balanced, what are your secrets to maintaining that balance?

 

On another note, I do have something very exciting to share with you this week: my new website, mowiekay.com has just gone live and I'd love it if you could take a look and let me know what you think.

  
In other news, I'm off to Montreal soon, which I'm very excited about. I've been once before and loved it. The food scene is amazing over there, I'll be meeting up with the fabulous Mayssam of Will Travel For Food and we've already got a lot planned. I was just wondering if any of you have been (or perhaps live there) as I'd love it if you could share some tips with me on what you think I should see, eat and do. I'd love to hear your suggestions.

As for this week's baking, it's a plumtastic medley of recipes: plum cake on a yeast dough with fresh thyme, plum cake with two bases and topped with ground coriander, and plums poached in vanilla and orange blossom water. Can you tell that I might have bought just a few too many plums?
 

I do love baking with plums as they macerate beautifully,  so much more than any other stone fruit, exuding almost all their juices, tainting the cake underneath into gorgeous shades of pinks and reds. This is why it's important to have thicker bases for plum cakes otherwise the juices just seep through to the bottom leaving the cake too moist to serve properly. I've used different flavours, spices and herbs for each recipe and you can omit these if you'd prefer, but I think they add amazing flavours to each of these recipes.

Happy Baking!