Plum

This cake is a tie-dyed composition of textures and flavors that starts with a tahini-enriched blondie base and continues with vanilla ice cream layered with seedy maple syrup and bands of cooked plums.

This salad is inspired by Chinese dish lao hu cai, otherwise known as tiger salad. Unripe plums, nectarines, or peaches marinate in a spicy dressing and get tossed with crisp celery and herbs.

All kinds of seasonal fruit are great in galettes. Serve warm (with ice cream or whipped cream) or at room temperature.

Chia seeds thicken this summery kefir-based white chocolate pudding, while coconut-candied pecans add a welcome bit of crunch.

Plums are summer’s all-stars. You should eat and cook with them only when they are peaking, plentiful, and widely available in many varieties.

You can use almost any type of plum in this salad recipe, even hybrid ones like Pluots and Peacotums. If it looks like a plum, it probably acts like a plum too.

Plums have a sweet but brightly acidic flavor, which suits them well as a topping for this savory porridge.

Bake your plums in an anise-tinged, pancake-like batter for a simple dessert that’s airy, silky, and just sweet enough.

The savory quality of the herbed sweet-sour plums, plus this incredibly creamy tahini and lemon dressing, is unthinkably tasty.

Waking up to the same breakfast day after day can be convenient and reliable, but it can get a bit boring. This breakfast cobbler is a great way to use pressure cooking in a less obvious way, and it simultaneously brings a delicious variation to your morning meal!

Budino is what Italians ask for when they want pudding. Sub in any stone fruit for the plums.

Slightly bruised or wrinkled stone fruit is ideal for making the infused syrup; peaches and nectarines work too.

Sangria often veers too far on the side of sugary. Grilled stone fruit adds a natural caramelized sweetness to the drink, and lends a smoky char to tame it down.

A heavy-hitting marinade and a vibrant plum and herb salad transform pork rib chops into a memorable summer meal.

Dark chocolate and ripe plums make a sweet match in this decadent late summer dessert.

Neither long simmering nor heat-canned, this vibrant, lightly spiced jam couldn't be simpler to prepare. Red-fleshed plums lend a gorgeous garnet color, but any variety works well.

The joy of this simple dessert is that it is even better at room temperature, so you can make it in advance with ease. Be sure to pull it from the oven when the egg mixture is just set, so that the luscious cooked plum texture can meld perfectly with the batter. Think of it as a thick fruit pancake cooked effortlessly in the oven while you do other things.

Beneath a humble, oaty streusel topping lies a sleek, inky jumble of plums and blackberries—talk about a delicious contrast. A combination of cornstarch and tapioca in the filling helps to keep the colors of the fruit true and to set up their juices nicely without becoming too thick.

Just about any fruit will work under this delicious lattice crust, but the sweet-tart trio of nectarines, plums, and raspberries is hard to beat.

My friend Keena lives less than a mile away and has a plum tree she can't keep up with. In early fall, she makes jam with as many plums as she can and sends me home with a big grocery bag full of them every time I see her. I'm not much of a canner, so I began sautéing them and using them as a topping for yogurt and porridge, and as a filling for these simple buckwheat crepes. While buckwheat groats have a pretty distinct flavor and can be a hard sell for many folks, buckwheat flour is commonly used and adored in both sweet and savory crepes. For this recipe, use oval-shaped Italian plums (or prune plums) if you can; they're nice and firm and lend themselves well to sautéing—or just plain snacking. Morning Notes: The crepe batter needs to rest for at least an hour, so plan accordingly or make the batter and refrigerate it overnight. If you go that route, the crepes cook best when the batter is at room temperature, so let it sit out for at least 30 minutes before cooking them.

With a recipe as simple as this, there’s no reason not to make dessert. The fruit comes out soft and tender, while the crumble is crisp and light golden brown. Experiment with other seasonal fruit combinations: raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries are other summer options, while apples, pears, and quince are perfect for fall. All are delicious with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.