Plum Crazy

I’m curious as to whether that expression is due to the absurd amount of plums that come raining down from the trees right about now and seem to have no actual projected end date. Crazy is forever.

And this goes on and on! I’ve made plum chutney, plum jam, plum cakes; I’ve halved and frozen plums, poached plums, dehydrated plums, and eaten plums. I’ve given away plums, which takes some work, as many other people seem to also have an abundance of the small purple bowel movers themselves. I took probably 30 or more pounds of plums to a food bank and found it closed. Disappointment!

All that said, my favorite thing so far was picking them. No, not because I enjoy the wobbly ladder to which I have access, or the myriad spiders crawling and swinging around me, or seeing (and avoiding) the plums that managed to rot on the tree, or even the rain that came when I was about half way and made me decide to put off the rest for the following day. The thing I liked was getting up high and reaching.

Um, I know, reminds one a little bit of step aerobics. But it was five steps up, reach, pick, toss, reach, pick, toss. I wasn’t being at all gentle with these guys and really did drop them down to the bucket I had balanced on the ladder’s shelf by my feet. And who wouldn’t! It’s fun to be up in a tree finding fruit, but once it’s found, and I realized early on that there was a whole lot of it, then there’s the of a chore of figuring out what to do with it. No interest at all in the one that goes astray with all 99 of the others clamoring for attention!

I’ll admit that the plum cake was fabulous. I froze enough plums that I’ll be able to make that any time I like all winter long. The cake is from a recipe I found about three years ago online and have since lost, but, you know, I remember the essentials: plums, sugar, butter, flour, baking powder, spices, buttermilk. It turns out fabulously no matter how I make it, so the essential aspect is definitely the plums. And it’s true that there were no eggs originally and I still don’t add any, which switches this cake into a sort of biscuit in my mind, which translates loosely into a cobbler, so to call it a cake at all is mere politeness to the original baker.

So my good times in the tree out front will make many more good times in the kitchen. If I decide it was all worthwhile, then I still have the other plum tree out back to start in on!! Crazy!