Karin's Week Twenty-Six Recipe: Plum Tart

Yay! I've made it half-way through the year, and am still cooking strongly. Appropriately enough, this week's recipe is not one out of a cookbook or off a website, but one that I pretty much made up out of things that sounded like they might go well together. I had 4 plums that were past ripe, and needed to be used in some fashion. We were also having company over for dinner, and they like experimenting with food just as much as we do.  So, without further ado, I give you Karin's Plum Tart.

Karin's Plum Tart

Crust for 9in pie
3 T raspberry jam
4 very ripe plums
5 oz cream cheese, softened
6-7 T sugar, divided

Preheat oven to 400 deg. Place crust into 9 or 10 in tart pan (the one with the very short sides). Melt raspberry jam in microwave until consistency of syrup. Using a spoon, cover the bottom of the crust with the raspberry jam, making sure to cover evenly. In a small bowl, mix together the cream cheese and 3 T of the sugar until cheese is of a spreadable consistency, rather like frosting. Spread cream cheese mixture into tart pan - this will take a bit of doing, as it does not like to stick to the jam. Slice plums into thin slices, and arrange over the cream cheese in a fan-like pattern, making sure to cover all of the cream cheese with the slices of plum. Sprinkle the tart with the remaining sugar, using enough so that it looks good, I think about 3-4 T was what was used..

Bake at 400 deg until crust is lightly browned, about 35 minutes. Let tart stand for about 4-5 minutes before serving.

This was something that I wasn't sure was going to turn out as well as it sounded in my head. However, I was pleasantly surprised. It smelled good, looked gorgeous (we even took a picture), and tasted so good, that my dinner guests wanted to know if we could just eat it all right then. I said why not, we're all grown ups, and so we did. A tart that lasted all of 20 minutes from the time I took it out of the oven to the time it was completely eaten is a good thing to have in my cooking repertoire. I may have to try this out with other fruits as I come across them. If you do, let me know how it tastes.