Friday 16 January 2015

Stewed Plums

Plums, plums, plums

So we have a loaded up plum tree out in the backyard. What are we going to do with all of these plums this year? We decided we really needed to pick the plums before they all landed on the ground and the dog ate them. Not good for him I know, but as a golden retriever Hercules is a bit of a pig when it comes to any form of food on the ground. Especially something as sweet as plums.

We had a bit of a debate. Should we try and make jam? To be honest I have never tried this. So we looked up some jam recipes. Looked easy enough I thought. 

Well no that idea went down like a lead balloon. My husband thought it would be too messy. Don't get me started on how he loves to clean in the kitchen. A good thing I hear you say. Well not always. Trouble is I'm a bit of a messy cook. I am learning not to make so much mess. After all of these years of marriage I have learned to put away as I go, a trait that makes my husband a happier person to be around. So I figure it is worth the effort.


So back to the plums. 

We decided to stew the plums. Yum I thought. So my husband went out and picked some. Some huh, 7 kg of plums as it turns out. As you can see by the picture below there are still plenty left on the tree.


Time to cook the plums
Plenty of plums left on the tree.
I looked up lots of recipes on how to stew plums. I've done it before but thought it might be nice to see how others did it. In the meantime my husband started removing the stones/seeds. I ended up helping as this was going to be a long job. I found a great recipe and showed it to my husband. Jamie Oliver, that seemed like the best place to start. Interested? Nope so we just did our own thing. Actually my husband did his own thing. He wanted to cook them himself.


Cooked Plums in a large saucepan
7kg of plums in there.


How much sugar? 

Well according to Jamie it is 2 heaped teaspoons per 500g of fruit. As I started measuring out the sugar hubby decided that what was left in the bottom of the large sugar container was enough. "Plenty here" he said and dumped it in. Oh well I guess we could taste as we go.

How much water? 

So again I looked to Jamie for inspiration. The answer was 2 tablespoons of water per 500g. "I've boiled the jug, so I'll just put the whole jug in". was what my husband said. So in went one jug full of water, and then another.

How long to cook it for?

Until it looks and tastes cooked I said. "OK". 

The result?

Well the result was lovely. Maybe a bit too much water, we had to siphon some off at the end. However as you can see I even had some on my porridge this morning.

Stewed plums on porridge.


Now to figure out what to do with those left on the tree ...


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