Plum and cinnamon slice

Another one from Hannah Miles' Cakes and Cookies book. I made it the other week to take to some friends and since a) it was a success and b) the pastry was on offer and I got 2 blocks, I've made it again :)

Ingredients

• 500g block puff pastry
• 4 tbsp ground almonds
• 1 tbsp icing sugar
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 100g marzipan, chilled in the freezer and then grated
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 10 plums, halved and stoned
• 55g flakes almonds
• 2 tbsp clear honey
• milk for glazing

Method

Preheat the oven to 190C.

Roll the pastry out to 20 x 30cm, 5mm thick and place it on a baking tray. Score a line 1-2cm from the edge, without cutting all the way through the pastry.

Mix the ground almonds, icing sugar and oil into a smooth paste. Spread it inside the lines on the pastry and sprinkle on the marzipan and the cinnamon. Place the plum halves on top, drizzle with honey and sprinkle with the almonds. Brush the edges of the tart with the milk.

Bake for 25-30 minutes - the pastry should be golden and the plums tender. Leave to cool on the tray and then cut into eight.

So, how did it turn out? I love this recipe. The plums are soft and the pastry edges and almonds are crispy, the sweet marzipan and honey pair up well with the slightly tart fruit, and the cinnamon gives it a lovely autumny warmth. On round 2 I put cinnamon in the ground almonds/sugar mixture, and also some extra oil to make the paste easier to spread (about half a tbsp is enough). I needed more than 10 plums (a dozen - and then I had to creatively flatten them to take up more space!) but even slightly underripe ones sweeten up perfectly.