Yet Another Cycling Forum

Random Musings => Miscellany => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: fd3 on 26 August, 2019, 06:38:23 pm

Title: Too many plums!
Post by: fd3 on 26 August, 2019, 06:38:23 pm
Made a couple cakes, some smoothies, not going to make jam.

The tree laughs at our efforts and we shall soon succumb to a couple thugs of rotting fruit.

What can we do with them (other than giving them away)?

Bonus points if anyone can instruct me in a way to turn them into booze.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: PaulF on 26 August, 2019, 06:43:34 pm
Plum gin?

Where are you? Ours largely failed this year, I’m not bothered but my wife likes them.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: hatler on 26 August, 2019, 06:44:22 pm
Get a suitable quantity of vodka and drop the plums in. Add a bit of sugar, shake bottles on a daily basis and after a while (no idea how long) you should end up with something pretty drinkable.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 26 August, 2019, 08:32:47 pm
Slivovitz is the archetypal plum alcohol. Slivo = plum. But I don't know how to actually make it. Anyway, to me there is no such thing as "too many plums". I'd just eat them all!
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: hellymedic on 26 August, 2019, 09:03:45 pm
We have similar issues!

I'm also not making jam this year.

I'm making compote, which I freeze for later use. This reduces volume occupied and gives indefinite shelf life.

Halve plums, remove stones and any trace of moth larvae, place in Pyrex casserole, add no water but a fair amount of sugar.

Microwave on full for long enough for plums to boil.

Stir. Allow to cool and decant into freezable boxes.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: ElyDave on 27 August, 2019, 09:28:47 am
Plum wine, you will need pectic enzyme or it will be hazy.

Then you are free to freeze it, or boil it for that slivovitz (legally of course  ;) )
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Little Jim on 27 August, 2019, 09:54:28 am
Mrs LJ halves and stones them like Helly suggests and then roasts them in the oven as this reduces the moisture content a bit, then freezes then.  Plum chutney is also very good, as long as you don't mind having about 2 pints of vinegar evaporated off into your house.  After a while you don't notice the smell...

We didn't have a huge crop this year, but a manageable one, and the plums were all a lot bigger than when we get one of the mega crops.

The pheromone plum moth traps work very well.  When we moved into the house 15 years ago just about every plum contained a maggot but now they are a rare sight.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: hellymedic on 27 August, 2019, 05:10:17 pm
We've not used the pheromone moth traps recently and they didn't seem to make a huge difference.
Early plums seem to get FAR more moth trouble than later ones.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: fd3 on 27 August, 2019, 06:28:54 pm
Plum gin?

Where are you? Ours largely failed this year, I’m not bothered but my wife likes them.
South Brum, nr cotteridge Park.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Quisling on 09 September, 2019, 10:45:28 pm
St Delia of BBC has a very excellent plum ketchup recipe in one of her tomes. Best left to mature for a couple of months. Makes a great HP sauce substitute and uses lots of plums.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: MikeFromLFE on 10 September, 2019, 05:10:46 pm
Made a couple cakes, some smoothies, not going to make jam.

The tree laughs at our efforts and we shall soon succumb to a couple thugs of rotting fruit.

What can we do with them (other than giving them away)?

Bonus points if anyone can instruct me in a way to turn them into booze.
For the first time since we have had our allotment the greengage trees have had a very poor crop this year.
So not a problem for us, or our neighbours, friends, the freezer, or my guts

Sent from my Moto E (4) Plus using Tapatalk

Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: T42 on 11 September, 2019, 08:58:32 am
Speaking of too many plums, my ride yesterday was fraught with sphinctorial stress. The quetsch season will do that to a chap.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Wobbly John on 11 September, 2019, 10:46:18 am
Not a problem I have this year. Loads of flowers, few fruits.
In the past I have brewed plum wine - distinctive taste, but good to cook with.
Plum chutney with star anise is gorgeous.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: T42 on 11 September, 2019, 12:37:58 pm
Plum chutney with star anise is gorgeous.

Shall pass that one on to MrsT. Ta!
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: hellymedic on 13 September, 2019, 12:19:02 am
Speaking of too many plums, my ride yesterday was fraught with sphinctorial stress. The quetsch season will do that to a chap.

Why just a chap?

Prunes and their ilk are known for their properties!
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: T42 on 13 September, 2019, 08:31:46 am
Chap being the short form of chapman, I assume that chapwoman and chapperson have also been added to The Abject's Dictionary, therefore chap may stand for all three.

OK, I'll get me to a moral peak in Darien.  Pass the ornithopter.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: pcolbeck on 25 September, 2019, 09:12:56 pm
Made a couple cakes, some smoothies, not going to make jam.

The tree laughs at our efforts and we shall soon succumb to a couple thugs of rotting fruit.

It must be related to our crab apple tree. I dont know how one relatively small tree can produce so much fruit.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: rogerzilla on 14 March, 2020, 10:19:49 am
This is the perennial (see what I did there) problem with plums.  Fresh whole-quality fruit don't keep more than a few days (which is why they are bizarrely expensive in supermarkets) and the trees produce a world-crushing crop all in one go.  Most cheap commercial jam has a plum base because it's so cheap and, once converted to jam, keeps.

So wither make jam, or farm angry drunken wasps.  They are very good for that too.

We has a yellow plum tree at the last house.  It was a victim of its own heavy cropping in the end - it literally ripped itself apart in front of me while I was having breakfast.  Split right down the middle under the weight of the fruit, and never recovered.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: MikeFromLFE on 14 March, 2020, 09:26:21 pm
After last year's crop of greengages completely failed at the allotment, the trees are currently looking healthy - probably in finer fettle than their minder at the moment!
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: fd3 on 23 August, 2020, 10:57:44 pm
Having better luck passing them on this year, but still a fair way to go.  My wife has found a "recipe" (sugar and wine) for storing them heated into jars - should last a year outside of the fridge.

I think in a year or two I'll investigate the plum wine option, it's just not great timing as I get back to work this time of year so faffing over plum wine is not so smart.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: ElyDave on 24 August, 2020, 06:19:21 am
I planted a heritage plum and greengage in the garden a few years back, watched patiently, pruned and finally this year we have a worthwhile crop.

Only problem was that it all came at once, from being hard as a rock one weekend to splitting open the next. I blame the alternating heatwave and  wet weather. At least the plums are a week or two later
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Ham on 24 August, 2020, 07:08:42 am
Noted something interesting (?) this year on our dwarfed Victoria tree (about 5 years old), which crops heavily for its size. This year, I deployed a Pheromone trap like this (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Agralan-M651-Plum-Fruit-Moth/dp/B0016KC8JO/), as previous years fruit was almost completely infested. The trap appeared to catch a large number of the moths.

The early ripening fruit still had a very high maggot coefficient, which was a little disappointing. However the main crop (still only about 20-25Kg) was almost completely worm free. So, overall a success and interesting link with early ripeners, either cause or effect.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: Little Jim on 24 August, 2020, 10:36:27 am
Noted something interesting (?) this year on our dwarfed Victoria tree (about 5 years old), which crops heavily for its size. This year, I deployed a Pheromone trap like this (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Agralan-M651-Plum-Fruit-Moth/dp/B0016KC8JO/), as previous years fruit was almost completely infested. The trap appeared to catch a large number of the moths.

The early ripening fruit still had a very high maggot coefficient, which was a little disappointing. However the main crop (still only about 20-25Kg) was almost completely worm free. So, overall a success and interesting link with early ripeners, either cause or effect.

I have also noticed that the fruit with maggots ripen first and have always assumed that it is something to do with the maggot but that is only a guess.  Keep at it with the traps as we did not find a single plum with a maggot this year where as when we first moved here literally every one had a maggot in it.

The downside is that the whole lot ripens at the same time.  We've managed to give about 30kg away to friends, have enough jam and chutney for about 10 years, the freezer is full and I have still had to bin 2 plastic sacks (the 25kg bags that the water softener salt comes in) full of rotting fruit and inebriated wasps.
Title: Re: Too many plums!
Post by: fd3 on 26 August, 2020, 11:32:22 pm
Some great success in giving away plums.  Neighbour gave us some home made strawberry jam in exchange and a friend gave us some home made miso! (To be fair we also gave her our fig crop, but it's just part of our plan to reduce wasps in the back garden).