This soft, buttery loaf cake, with chopped apple and apricot jam swirled through the top, is essentially a dressed-up pound cake (Italians charmingly call it a ‘plum cake’, using the English words but pronouncing the ‘u’ as ‘oo’.) It’s inspired by a cake that I succumbed to more than once at Il Forno del Porto, my local bakery in Porto Ercole, especially during times when the oven at home was off limits. As we made the rounds of the port on our daily ritual, picking up groceries from the fruttivendolo (fruit and vegetable shop) or the pescheria (fish shop), my toddler, usually dressed in a tutu of some kind, would always be given something from shop owners – in the forno it was one of their little pink or white meringues, as fluffy and light as a cloud.
Highly adaptable, this cake can be made in many different ways. I often combined polenta with the regular flour for a rustic cake with a good crumb. You can leave out the apple or exchange it for another fruit (pear, apricots, berries or plums would all be nice). Just don’t skimp on whipping the eggs – it’s what makes this cake so soft and fluffy without any other rising agents.