Plums

enjoy the season while it lasts

Things have been pretty plummy around here (pun absolutely intended). Local stone fruits have a very brief season here, and since I’m semi-addicted to my own plum jam, I had to work fast. Last year I was extremely busy at this time and somehow blinked and missed them, only making a small batch that I gave most of away, expecting to make more. By the time I finally got my shit together, the plums were gone, and instead of the jars of garnet goop that sustain me for months on end, I had just the one.

So when this year rolled around and I saw them, I did not hesitate. I bought up all the nice plums in the neighbourhood and made two batches in quick succession; one of the corner store ladies actually sighed when I picked up the bag of plums for sale, saying “I’ll take them all.” Guiltily, I left half a kilo for the other plum-lovers of the alley, and, for my third batch, took a ten-minute walk to where I’d seen a different shop with a large, plastic vegetable crate of them.

Peaches I prefer to eat fresh, and more than once recently I’ve shared them out with those I ran into after buying them; everyone seemed surprised and delighted; they are hard to find and easy to miss. Local peaches and plums are usually sold by vegetable vendors; the fruit shops are mostly filled with imported fruit, but these beauties are local. Not large—some of the plums are basically the size of a generous cherry—but flavorful, sweet and tart, and the latter is good because the high pectic makes a nice set. And of course, makes them delightful to eat fresh, too.

One year, I added some star anise to the plums, which was a nice touch, but these days, I enjoy it basic: a little less than half sugar to original fruit weight. It’s not an exact science, but I like my preserves a little tart. Some years I’ve added a squeeze of lemon but this year the plums were sour enough without it.

It feels almost silly to put this into words, it’s been said so many times, but seasonal eating is such a joy. Don’t get me wrong, I miss what you can only get briefly or not at all except as exorbitant imports (like actual cherries), but there’s a joy in consuming and preserving something putting in its brief annual appearance. And then savoring what you made throughout the year.

Again—this is not new; it’s why people have been preserving and putting food up for centuries. Millennia, probably. One year the plum jam I made lasted me nearly until the season came round again. And recently, I learned from a friend that when fresh peas are plentiful, you can toss them, pods and all, into your freezer, ready to use when you need them. As someone who has podded/blanched/frozen them in containers in the past, this has been a revelation.

I’ve also found that making things that people like eating is honestly one of the greatest joys ever. (Is this my Italian side speaking?)

I know I said I made my last batch, and honestly, the weather is really too warm to be boiling things away on the stove for hours on end; but yesterday I saw some very pleasing specimens, and I was tempted. I’m trying to remind myself of that third and final batch, which I left unattended for a short time and that then boiled over into my cutlery drawer, during the week when we had no water. Do I really want to risk it again?

Friends whom I’ve given preserves to often save empty jars for me, and I have a heap of these, in all shapes and sizes. Once filled with hot plum jam, they sit on the kitchen counter to cool, each batch a slightly different shade of purple-garnet, and when the afternoon sun coming in the window lights them up, it’s something beautiful.