Boil some prunes until tender. Remove the kernels and mash the prunes well. Mix with sugar, cinnamon and lemon-juice to taste. Make a rich biscuit dough, roll out and place on a well-buttered baking-pan. Fill with the prunes and let bake until done. Serve cold.
April 9 — No. 9
German
A one-line sketch rather than a recipe in the modern sense, but everything needed is there once the vague terms are pinned down. Treat it as a thick prune butter baked on a shortcake-style crust.
- "Remove the kernels"The kernels here are the stones, not the almond-like seed inside them. Buy pitted prunes and the step disappears; if using unpitted, stone them after cooking, when the flesh slips away easily.
- QuantitiesNone are given. About 1 lb (450 g) prunes cooked in water to cover yields roughly 2 cups of thick pulp, enough to cover a 9x13-inch pan. Sugar will be needed in modest amounts only, perhaps 1/4 cup, since prunes are already sweet.
- Cook the prunes down, not just softThe filling has to be stiff enough to sit on dough without soaking it. Simmer until tender, drain off most of the liquid, then mash and, if it is still loose, dry it in the pan over low heat until it mounds on a spoon.
- "Rich biscuit dough"A "rich" biscuit dough generally means a baking-powder dough shortened with a good deal of butter, closer to shortcake than to a plain breakfast biscuit; some versions also take an egg. Roll it about 1/2 inch thick and press it up the sides of the pan slightly to hold the filling.
- Oven temperatureThe original says only "until done." A biscuit dough of this thickness wants 400F (200C) for 25 to 30 minutes, until the base is browned at the edges and set underneath.
- Lemon and cinnamon"To taste" is doing a lot of work. Start with the juice of half a lemon and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon per pound of prunes; the acid is what keeps the filling from tasting flat and cloying.
- ServingServed cold, as directed, it cuts into neat squares — about 12 from a 9x13 pan. Warm, the filling stays soft and the pieces slump.
German fruit kuchen — Pflaumenkuchen or, in the south, Zwetschgenkuchen — is traditionally made with fresh Italian prune plums halved and shingled over a yeast or short dough in late summer, and is a fixture of the German baking year. This entry, which the original heads only "No. 9 German," reads as an American adaptation: dried prunes stand in for fresh plums, and a quick baking-powder dough for the yeast base. Dried prunes were a cheap and widely available pantry staple in American households.