Plum Jam

These plums are from my Grandmother’s old plum tree in Wadestown, Wellington.

This year has produced a bumper harvest so, what to do with 2½ kg of ripe plums?

I decided on a plum jam, it is a great way to use up quantities of fruit. Opting for a recipe from Stephanie Alexander’s “The Cook’s Companion” I began the laborious task of halving the fruit and removing the stones. The picture above depicts the prepared fruit.

Recipe:

2½ kg washed plums

1.25 kg sugar

2 tablespoons lemon juice

Halve the plums and remove the stone. Place in a large bowl.Take 10 of the plum stones and with a meat mallet,crack the stones and remove the kernels,  wrap them in some muslin, tie it up and put it in the centre of the fruit.

Add the sugar, stir through and leave at room temperature overnight.

Next day, tip fruit into a wide non reactive saucepan and bring to the boil over a medium heat, stirring occasionally to prevent the mixture catching on the bottom of the pot.

Skim the froth that will rise to the top as the mixture comes to the boil.

Add the lemon juice and simmer for about 25 minutes until temperature reaches 105°C.

Remove from heat and allow to settle for 5 minutes.

Squeeze out all the juices from the muslin bag, using the back of a spoon and a sieve, into the jam. Ladle the jam into sterilised jars and seal.