Plum Cake

Hello! I thought I would take a break in-between my travel diary posts to give you my favourite recipe of the moment - super delicious plum cake! My mother grabbed this recipe from an issue of Martha Stewart Living a few years back and it's a real gem. I don't know about you but usually when I try one of Martha Stewarts recipes things do not go well. I truly think Martha leaves important instructions/ingredients out of her recipes just so no one can ever truly recreate her masterpieces (I have a love/hate relationship with her). Anyways, this is the one Martha Stewart recipe I've tried that always goes over very well. The cake is soft and sweet with a crunchy outer layer with thinly sliced plums fanned over top. One great thing about this recipe is that you can go ahead and top it with whatever fruit you have laying about. I've tried with plums, nectarines and cherries and they all came out great. I can't wait for Autumn so I could try a version with apples or pears. So exciting!

Martha Stewart's Plum Cake -

Ingredients:

4 TBSP unsalted butter, room temperature + more for the pan

1 cup all-purpose flour + more for the pan

1/2 TSP baking powder

1/4 TSP baking soda

1/2 TSP coarse salt

3/4 sugar + more for sprinkling over top

1 large egg

1/2 cup butter milk (or 1/2 cup milk with 1/2 TBSP white vinegar mixed in - sit for 10 minutes)

2-3 ripe plums (or whatever fruits you have on hand), thinly sliced

Method:

1 - Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 8-9 inch cake pan and dust with flour. Tap out any excess.

2 - Whisk together your dry ingredients in a medium sized bowl. Using your electric mixer on medium speed, cream together your butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Beat in the egg. In three additions add in your dry ingredients mixture, alternating with your buttermilk.

3 - Pour your batter into the prepared cake pan and smooth the top over with an offset spatula or a knife. Fan your thinly sliced plums (or whatever fruit you have) over top and sprinkle with sugar.

4 - Pop your pan in the oven of 35-40 minutes or until golden brown and an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let cool and enjoy!

Thank you for reading! x

Munich Photo Diary

From Salzburg we took a train into Munich, where we spent the next five days. Germany was never on my list of places I needed to visit, but I'm so glad I did. Munich is so historic and beautiful, I'm sure my eyes were as big as saucers looking around at all of the beautiful sights. Two days while we were in Munich we specifically for two different tours, so during the rest of our time there we mostly just wandered around and ate a lot of pretzels. 

One day we traveled to the town of Füssen to visit Neuschwanstein Castle. I like to think I'm some what well traveled and I can safely say that I have never seen anything quite as impressive as this castle. My photos hardly do it any justice. It was spectacular and I was in absolute awe.  To get up to the castle we had to trek up this steep hill, which was not fun at all - but it was so worth it. If you are ever near Füssen you really need to go! I demand it. This castle was another one of the highlights of my trip.

Another day we took a trip to the town of Dachau to take a tour of the Dachau Concentration Camp. The camp now serves as a memorial site and there are several memorials located on site. I didn't take any photos during our visit, I borrowed the photograph of one of the memorials from my lovely pal Monika (Monika - I hope you don't mind!). We walked through Barrack X, which housed the gas chamber and walking through there was truly chilling. It was interesting (and utterly horrifying) to hear some of the stories our tour guide shared with us. Definitely one of the most eye opening experiences of my trip.

On a much lighter note, our remaining days in Munich were spent popping in and out of shops and visiting beer gardens. In the evenings the beer gardens would stop serving half litres of beer, so only full litres were available. I'm not much of a beer drinker, so I struggled a bit (my two friends finished with ease). I was quite sad to be leaving Munich, mainly because I was leaving my two friends behind. I made the decision to leave my friends halfway through our trip to visit  England. So I boarded a train and was now en route to London! 

Stay tuned for my London photo diary coming up soon! x

Austria Photo Diary

Hi everyone! I know it's been a while since my last post but I've recently returned from my three week trip around Europe so I've got plenty of posts lined up. So, on the ninth of June two of my best friends and I headed to the airport. Our first European destination was Austria, where we spent three days in Vienna and two days in Salzburg. I figured I'd combine both cities into one post so I have a lot of photos to share with you here. So, maybe grab a cup of tea because this is going to be a lengthly one!

Vienna is definitely one of my favourite cities that I have ever visited, it is so incredibly beautiful there I wish I had more time to explore the city. We got a little bit too lucky with the weather, it was very sunny but way too hot... Like thirty-seven degrees Celsius! Crazy! For most of our time in Vienna we just wandered aimlessly around the city and eating lots of desserts (plenty of apple strudel!!!). One evening we visited the Central Cemetery, which is one of the largest cemeteries in the world. We arrived less than an hour before closing time so it was very quiet and peaceful walking through there. If you ever get the chance to visit Vienna you should definitely take the time to walk through there and marvel at how beautiful and overgrown it is.

I think my favourite day in Vienna was when we visited Schönbrunn Palace. Just walking through the gardens was absolutely spectacular. We got to walk through the interior of the palace, which was just as impressive as the grounds. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take photos inside, but all of the rooms were so beautiful and the walls were decorated with such ornate designs. After walking around such a wonderful palace all day we obviously had to stop for some apple strudel.

Our last day in Vienna was also a really great day. One of the girls I went with has a friend who wass touring with Cirque du Soleil in Austria and invited us to one of the shows. I've never been to a Cirque du Soleil show so that was really awesome to see! The next morning we took the train to Salzburg... so keep on scrolling for even more photos! So exciting +*+*

Also! We stayed at the Wombat's City Hostel at the Naschmarkt which was really great! It was super clean and within walking distance of lots of cool places. If you ever visit Vienna I would really recommend staying here! Now, onto Salzburg!

One thing you should know about me is that I'm a big fan of the Sound of Music and I can (and very often will) sing all of the songs from the movie at the top of my lungs. One thing I have always wanted to do was go on the Sound of Music Tour in Salzburg - so that's what we did! Our main reason to visit Salzburg was to go on the tour, so we were only there for two days. Like Vienna, Salzburg was quite beautiful and full of historic buildings and wonderful architecture. However, it was also much more quiet and not quite as busy going out in the evenings, so I'm glad that we didn't stay there for any longer. The tour was definitely one of the main highlights of my trip! It was sooooo cool seeing some of the filming locations and driving up through the hills to see all these beautiful lakes and tiny towns. We didn't really get up to much else while in Salzburg. So, there's Austria! Done and dusted!

Next up... Munich!