Glorious Gluts

I'm starting to panic a bit if I'm honest, I think I've got to admit defeat with the patty pan mountain (maybe one more batch of piccalililili though) the tomatoes are coming on stream so I need to start making ketchup and the wild fruit is just ripening up too. Damsons looking readyish, the pear tree is groaning, we visited our old chum the wild plum tree yesterday and came home with 5kilos of plums, oh yes, and we still have about 5 kilos of Mirabelle plums in the freezer waiting to be processed.

I have a soft spot for this tree as it was one of our first big foraging finds, back in the day when we were still amazed at all the free fruit hanging around being ignored by the general populace. I don't know what sort of plum it is, it's not a damson because the fruit is sweeter and not so dark purple, they're smaller than Victoria plums but a similar colour.

Each year it's a battle to outwit the grubs (wasps?) as when the plums are fully ripe it can be virtually guaranteed that a small wiggly worm is in there, pooing for all it's worth, leaving a tell tale droplet of crystalised plum juice sitting on the softly bloomed surface. My solution is two-fold, early in the season I pick the plums slightly under-ripe (I'm so well acquainted with this tree by now I can tell the exact ripeness by the colour of the skin) The plums which are still green now will ripen later in the season and will usually escape the attentions of the wasps who have done whatever it is that wasps do in the winter (sleep/die/emigrate - who knows) by the time they're ripe, although whether they have escaped the attention of other foragers is another thing, there was already the familiar trampled ring of disappointment around the tree yesterday.

So what to do with them? Jam maybe, for the increased pectin in the under-ripe plums, or a plum cheese, nice and sharp or maybe bottled with red wine and spices. Whatever I end up doing I'd better get on with it quick as there's more fruit coming down the conveyor belt!

By the way - Many apologies for the blog silence over the past week, I've had my Mum to stay and we've been busy either taking the children out on day trips or Adam and I have been making the most of having a babysitter in the house and having a social life for once. All back to normal now though.

Glutton for punishment (and fruit)

After my busy day on Wednesday I spent Thursday continuing my bottling experiments - more of which anon. By Thursday afternoon the house was free of fruit (apart from the cherry plums in the freezer) so, naturally, on Friday I re-stocked.

A friend very kindly asked if I'd like to accompany him on a visit to his friend's house (friend of friend, with me so far?) with an actual orchard. I arrived bearing jam, chutney and chilli jelly by way of recompense but by the end of the visit that felt woefully inadequate compared to the bounty we left with.

The star of the show as far as I was concerned was a damson tree, groaning with achingly beautiful inky blue black fruit. It was here I discovered the advantage of a maintained orchard over foraged fruit. The grass around the tree is neatly trimmed and free of weeds, nettles etc and rotten fallen fruit is regularly removed. This meant all we had to do was shake the tree so that damsons rained down around us (the children adored this bit) and then we just picked them up off the floor with the children helping in a meaningful way for a change. I haven't weighed our crop yet as there's way more than our scales could cope with, I'm guessing at 6 kilos or so.

And that was just the start .....

Victoria Plums, 2 varieties of eating apple, bramleys and pears followed. A very productive afternoon all round.

My plans are to bottle the plums with spiced brandy (provided I can make this bottling thing work) pickle some damsons using a different method to the one I used the other day, more plum and elderberry crumble for Willow, damson and elderberry gin and umm ... more jam I guess!

Just a Quick Boast ...

..... about my fabby foraging day!

Yesterday Sophie very kindly let me loose on her plum tree so I now have a small mountain of sweet and delicious plums to process. I'm planning on pickling most of them. Last year I pickled some Japonica Quince and blackberries, at the time I was somewhat disappointed and as a result they've languished, unloved, at the back of the pantry. I dusted them off the other day with the intention of chucking the fruit and re-using the jars but luckily I decided to taste some first. Giving the fruit time to mature has transformed them, it's hard to convey how lovely they are, the Quince have a rich, deep, complex taste, spicy and Christmassy. It's going to be hard convincing people that there's no alcohol in there! The blackberry vinegar is a revelation, I imagine a generous splosh would be nice added to slow cooked shin beef. So pickled plums for next year it is.

Inspired by Hugh Watson on Twitter we picked some elderberries this afternoon with the intention of making apple and elderberry pie at some point over the weekend and then swung by the pear tree we spotted the other day. We nibbled a few by the road, trying to decide if they were ripe or whether they needed a bit more time. We couldn't decide so picked what we thought was a small bowlful for further consideration at home. Highlight of the day was my stunt involving transforming grabby thing into a giant catapult and firing a pear halfway down the field while the kids watched open mouthed.

Back home the 'small bowlful' turned out to be more akin to a bathful so, ummm, pickled pears too I guess. But for the moment I'm putting all fruit out of my mind and concentrating on Warrington Wolves - Come on the Wire!