At the end of each week I try to use up any of our leftover fruit before our next Oddbox arrives. This normally involves making some form of freezer snack for my 20 month old son and I work through a rotation of muffins, flap-jacks, biscuits & purees.

This week however I decided the adults of the house deserved a treat, mainly because as I stared at the apples & plums in my fruit bowl, they seemed to scream short-cake at me.

I found this recipe online and adapted it as below. I’m not a great baker having only really ventured into it like the rest of the world during lock-down but this was super simple. The cake did turn out slightly under-baked and next time I’ll add an extra 5 minutes to the cooking time, but my oh my it tasted of buttery goodness.

It’s worth keeping this cake in the fridge if you’re not able to eat it straight away as the fruit made the cake soggy after a day or so, I’d also consider not stewing the fruit first to prevent this in future bakes.

The recipe below could also be adapted for any leftover fruit you have. What would you use?

INGREDIENTS

• 1 egg
• 300g plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 200 g soft butter
• 200g caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 300g plums/apples (or fruit of your choice)

METHOD

Preheat oven to 180c.

Place chopped fruit in pan with a few tbsps of water and stew over a low heat for 10 minutes before draining.

Cream butter and sugar with wooden spoon until light & fluffy.

Add the egg and vanilla and beat well.

Fold in the flour and baking powder until well combined.

Press two-thirds of the shortcake mixture into the base of a greased loaf tin.

Lay the stewed fruit over the base.

Sprinkle the remaining shortcake mixture on top and press down gently.

Bake for 35 minutes, until lightly golden brown.