A Fall Transition: Pecan Plum Meringue Cake

A Fall Transition: Pecan Plum Meringue Cake

Styling & words: Bevin Valentine Jalbert / Photography: Siobhan Egan

I’ve always thought of plums as an early fall fruit, even though they, like other stone fruits, actually arrive earlier in the season, especially here in South Georgia. It’s something about the deep...well, plum, color that speaks of fall to me. A departure from the peachy tones of...peaches (gosh, my descriptors) and apricots, the color of plums is a richer hue of purple and deep red that I associate with the same late summer/early fall arrival of figs. It’s a transitional produce in my mind (seeing as the plums used in this recipe appeared in my farm bag in mid-July, whether farmers would agree is another story, and one I’m not allowing to interfere with the mental story I’m writing about plums).

When I wanted to create (um, adapt--I’m not a recipe developer, I’m a recipe enthusiast and stylist) a recipe celebrating the fall (summer) plum, I wanted it to be a recipe that spoke of transition. Summer to fall. Sweat-soaked days to crisp afternoons. Linen dresses to...okay, more linen dresses.

Fall here in Savannah is kind of like plums. It’s a story we write. Many years we skip fall entirely, with just a week or two of transitional weather in late October or early November before winter appears. Or, seen another way, fall lasts from November to March, generally sprinkled in with 80-degree days. (82 on Thanksgiving? Sure. 78 on Christmas? Why not? Running the A/C on New Year’s Eve? Has definitely happened.) Yet we still have an idea of fall (remember those crisp afternoons I mentioned above?) that we perform, setting out mums that inevitably get fried in the late September heat, setting out fall decor, shopping for jackets and sweaters we probably won’t wear until January, and waiting for a day that’s below 80 to justify making soup or pumpkin bread.

That’s what’s so lovely about this cake. It captures that tension between summer and fall, the light sweetness of the meringue combining with the depth of pecans and plums, all mingling together with warm cinnamon hinting at cooler temperatures to come. I think we must be due for a year with more of a true fall (no hurricanes, please) since it’s been several years of oppressive Octobers, but even it’s not in the cards for 2020 (because 2020), we still have plums.

Naturally, I turned to Pinterest for inspiration, and came across a Kitchen McCabe recipe for Cherry Almond Meringue Butter Cake. It rang all my bells. Stone fruit? Check. Intentionally rustic? Check. Meringue, a technique I’d been interested in experimenting with? Check. An opportunity to use my vintage matching floral cake plate and server? Check. Almonds? Ch...well, I could work around that.*

*I have nothing against almonds, and use them in a variety of other applications, but I didn’t see a place for them in my dream of a seasonal plum dessert.

After reading the Kitchen McCabe recipe (which, in turn, is based on an Ottolenghi recipe), I knew it would work for what I wanted to do, with a few modifications. Of course, I subbed in plums for the cherries, slicing them and tossing them with cinnamon, roughly chopped pecans, and a dash of salt. Since it was my first attempt with meringue, I followed a more detailed meringue tutorial that served me well. The recipe calls for an 8” springform pan, which I do not own, because even though I’m a sometimes food stylist, I’m not a professional baker. I used my 9” springform, lined it with parchment paper, and called the results rustic. The cake batter is thick enough that it can kind of be arranged in the pan without spreading to the sides, and rather than cut out a nice disk for the bottom of my pan and another strip to line the sides, I just scrunched a big piece of parchment in the pan and tore off the most atrocious overhang. It was fine. (I also forgot to add the egg yolks to the batter until the end, which I don’t recommend, but again, it was fine. Speaking of which, this is the rare pleasing recipe where you get to separate egg yolks and whites and use both separately. You will end up with one extra egg yolk, and what you do with that yolk is between you and your conscience.) 

You can see the original Kitchen McCabe recipe here. For my interpretation, I followed the cake recipe exactly, other than baking it the wrong pan, and changed up the fruit layer as described above.