Whole Wheat Dimply Prune Cake - Where have you been?

There, I made it!
Well now, I have to make a small speech.
I know, I have been MIA for awhile, hmm... what shall we call that now? Writer's block, I-experiment-too-much-that-I-ran-out-of-ideas (oh come on, that is not going to happen, you know that!), or just sheer laziness.
Like William Shakespeare named it, I am going to leave that up to you "As you like it." :)
Having said that, I am thankful to all the emails and comments/messages I got during my short, er... shall we call it a long break. I am perfectly fine, and all my ten digits are intact and I never could be happier for them.
Sometimes, it feels good to be missed! I totally enjoyed all the attention ;)
Can I get more?

During my time away, I did manage to check on some of your blogs, even though I could not comment, I now want to let you know I was there.
Generous souls have showered my blog with awards, which I would like to acknowledge here. I appreciate every little gesture. Merci. I will get around to visiting other blogs and your posts soon.

I have some amazing recipes, some of which, or a lot of it are my own creations as usual. If you have followed my blog, you would know me and my love for experimenting with food, and making healthy, wholesome eatables.
If you are new here, then "My Archives" would be a great place to start.

I am going to celebrate my being back in the blogging arena with a cake today. If you are as thrilled as me, you could send me cakes too, real ones I mean ;)
And my address is...

What cake are we talking about today? A cute one, a healthy one and a sure-to-impress deal. You will need nice ripe prunes (mine were not), and after cooling the cake, the juices from the prunes do soak into the cake, making it soft and moist.
There are a lot of recipes on the internet for this cake, but I adapted my recipe from Smitten Kitchen, just because I fell in love with the way it looked. How can I not! It is a beauty.



Whole wheat Dimply Prune Cake

Whole wheat pastry flour - 1 1/2 cups
Cardamom powder - 2 pinches
Baking powder - 2 tsp
Salt - A pinch
Unsalted butter - 4 tbsp
Light brown sugar - 1/2 cup
Eggs - 2 large
Sunflower oil - 2-3 tbsp
Vanilla extract - 1 tbsp
Cold milk - 1-2 tbsp (optional)
Red prunes/plums - To top, as shown in picture. Use as many as you like.

Method:

Sift flour, salt, baking powder and cinnamon and set aside.

Halve the prunes and take the seeds out.



Butter/spray a 8" square cake pan, dust scantily with flour if you are buttering it.

Preheat oven to 350F.

In a mixing bowl, combine butter and sugar till light and creamy with the help of a hand mixer. Use room temperature butter for best results. Add the oil next.

Add eggs one by one and keep whipping. When the mixture reaches a very pale yellow color (about 5 min), stop and add vanilla. Mix well.

Add the sifted dry ingredients slowly and combine well (you should still be using the hand mixer). Be careful not to over mix, when you see the last bit of flour mixed with the wet ingredients, stop. Over mixing the batter will result in a tough cake.
If at any point, if you feel the mixture is too thick, you may add a tablespoon or two of cold milk to loosen the batter.

Pour the batter into the cake pan. Top the batter with halved prunes/plums with cut side facing up.



Bake at 350F for about 30-35 min. Check for done'ness with a toothpick insert test.



Remove from oven, cool on rack, right side up for about 20 min.

Cut into squares like I did, or do whatever you want with it. Its your cake now!



Sending this cake off to Meeta'a Monthly Mingle #32 – Spring Cakes