2010 is going down in my books as the year of the fig.  Tomatoes may have disappointed, casualties of the unusually cool Northern California summer, but the figs have been magnificent.

Black Mission figs began arriving at the farmers market from the Central Valley a couple of weeks ago and we’ve been eating them out of hand, off the grill, or baked in this cake.  They’ve been exceptionally sweet and juicy.

Then the huge brown Turkey figs and delicate green Adriatic figs showed up and they’ve been wonderful, too.

If your only encounters with figs have been in those dry Fig Newtons your mom packed in your lunchbox, you’re in for a surprise.  A perfectly ripe fig is a voluptuous fruit, soft and yielding in texture.  It’s subtly sweet with hints of honey and vanilla.

The trick is to get a ripe one.  Figs don’t ripen properly once they’re picked and under-ripe fruits aren’t worth eating.

Choose figs that are soft, moist and heavy for their size.  They should feel like little water balloons in your palm.  Some cracking along the sides, slight wrinkling at the neck and a drop of syrupy juice at the blossom end are good signs of ripeness.

Eat them or bake them in this homey cake right away.  They are extremely perishable and don’t last more than a day or two before they begin to mold.  Store them on the kitchen counter in a single layer without touching.

The cake is an adaptation of a Viennese recipe from my friend Rebecca’s Austrian aunt and grandmother.  They usually made it with apricots, but I’ve made it with plums and just knew it would be an ideal backdrop for figs.

It’s a classic European-style sponge cake with a light, tender texture and open crumb that soaks up the fig juices beautifully–although it’s better made with fruit that is still a little firm and doesn’t collapse altogether during baking.  The addition of grated orange peel makes the flavors pop.

I’ve translated the European weights into cups and tablespoons and put much more detail into the instructions.  The original recipe was pretty minimal, expecting the cook to know a lot about baking.  While the cake works if you just “mix egg yolks with sugar,” as the recipe directs, the texture is far better if you beat the yolks until pale and thick before gradually adding the sugar.  The slightly complicated layering of yolks, beaten whites and sifted flour mixture also delivers a lighter and more tender cake than merely stirring the flour  and baking powder into the yolks and sugar, then folding the beaten whites into the stiff batter.

Once you’ve made the cake with figs, all sorts of other possibilities will emerge.  I think it would be great with blueberries and Rebecca suggests you can make it with fresh cherries.