Making things with plums

When we bought our house back in 1998 it already had a well established plum tree in the back garden. It has continued to crop well every year, so much so that one year the weight of fruit broke some of the branches. We have learnt from this and thin out the fruit in early July but we still get pounds and pounds of fruit from it. Most of this I earmark for jam and chutney making but I also like to use some of it in cakes and bakes.

This week I invited a friend over to help herself to several pounds of plums from my tree and when she arrived she had a magazine under her arm containing a recipe for plum flapjacks. I hurriedly scribbled it down and later that afternoon I modified it and made my own version of them. And what a hit they turned out to be! Gooey, sticky and a cross between a flapjack and a cake. I think you could even serve it hot with custard!

Plum flapjacks

1 lb (454g) plums
½ teaspoon mixed spice
Pinch of salt
8 oz (225g) light muscovado sugar
8 oz (225g) butter
3 tablespoons golden syrup
10 oz (275g) oats
5 oz (145g) plain flour

Wash the plums then cut them in half and remove the stones. Chop into small pieces and place in a bowl. Sprinkle over the spice, salt and 2 oz (55g) of the sugar. Stir and set a side. Preheat oven to 200°C, gas 6 and grease a 20 by 20cm tin. Put the remaining sugar, butter and syrup in a saucepan and melt together. Put the oats and flour into another bowl and mix in the melted ingredients. Spoon half this mixture into the base of the tin and use wetted fingers to press it down as an even layer. Spoon the plums over this as another layer then finish with the remaining oat mixture and press down lightly. Bake for 40-45 minutes until bubbling and golden. Remove from the oven and use a spatula to run around the edge of the flapjack. Leave to cool completely in the tin then cut into suitable sized pieces.

The flapjacks didn't last a week - they were gobbled up by Thursday, so this afternoon I adapted a fruit cake recipe to make plum and orange fruit cake and this too proved to be yummy. I think I need to strip the tree and freeze the remaining plums so I can make more of these plum recipes throughout the year.

Plum and Orange Fruit Cake

8 oz (225g) self-raising flour
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon mixed spice

8 oz plums

5 fl oz (150ml) water
Zest and juice of 2 oranges
14 oz (400g) mixed dried fruit

4 oz (115g) butter or margarine
4 oz (115g) soft light brown sugar
2 tablespoons sherry
2 eggs, beaten

Preheat oven to 170°C, gas mark 3 and line a cake tin. Sift the flour, salt and spice into a bowl. Stone and chop the plums then place in a large pan with the orange zest and juice and the water. Bring to the boil and cook for about 10 minutes then add the dried fruit, butter and sugar. Stir until the butter has melted then bring back to the boil and simmer for another 10 minutes. Set aside and allow to cool. Add the sherry to the mix then pour the mix onto the dry ingredients and stir well. Stir in the egg then pour into the cake tin. Cook for one and a half hours. Test with a skewer and cool in the tin.

Having filled the cake tin again I didn't really need to make anything else for dessert but there were still plenty of plums so I decided to preserve some as plum crumble. A while ago I had bought 12 mini foil containers with lids from Poundland and these proved to be the perfect for making individual portion sized crumbles. It was satisfying to stack them up in the freezer, ready for another day when I have neither a ready supply of plums nor the time to make dessert.

Plum and Orange Crumble (makes 4 portions)

8-12 plums

1 orange

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

100g light muscovado sugar

125g butter

75g plain flour

75g wholemeal flour

25g oats

Stone and halve the plums and place them in a bowl with the zest and juice of the orange, the cinnamon and 50g of the sugar. Stir well then spoon into the crumble container.s Cut the butter up into small cubes and add 3 cubes to each of the 4 crumble containers. Put the remaining butter in a bowl with the flour and rub to breadcrumb texture. Add the sugar and oats to the crumble mix then scatter this over the plum mix. Seal the crumble containers and freeze if desired. To cook, thaw completely and bake for 15-20 minutes at 180°C, gas 4 until the juices start to bubble through the crumble. Serve hot with cream, custard or ice-cream.

Pancakes... in September...?!

As you may already know I'm a huge fan of duck. Very tasty! My very favourite way to eat it is Chinese style with pancakes, hoi sin sauce and cucumber and spring onions. Unfortunately, buying a kit for this meal is quite expensive and something we only have on special occasions. It is also unfortunate that my daughters love this meal too because it means there are never enough pancakes to go around. I have searched the shops for the pancakes on their own but alas they don't exist. I have also puzzled over the ingredients and wondered how to make them myself. A few attempts have resulted in pancakes but not the right type.

A few months ago I decided to write to the people who put together the excellent food magazine OLIVE. To my surprise shortly after sending my email I received a reply for Lulu Grimes with a recipe. I was very impressed! Then as I sat at breakfast in a static caravan in south Yorkshire in the last week of the school holidays I turned over the page of my September OLIVE magazine and there on the letters page was my name and the recipe for Chinese pancakes. Not only was I chuffed but I was also motivated to give the recipe a go.

At the moment Lidls are selling whole frozen duck for about £5 each which is much cheaper than any other way to buy duck so whilst I put one on the draining board to thaw I set about making pancakes. It is amazing what boiling water and flour can do. I have a feeling that to make pancakes as fine and delicate as the ones in the kits you either need some kind of mysterious factory machinery or to have been brought up in a Chinese household. Nevertheless once I'd figured out that they really needed to be rolled very thin and the oil needed to be properly hot before putting the pancake in the pan I managed to make some Chinese pancakes. They were a little more like a wrap than a proper Chinese pancake but still pretty good. I left them stacked between two plates until dinner time then once everything else was dished up I heated them in the microwave for 30 seconds. At least this way there were plenty to go round.

I figure with a little more practise they will become thinner and finer so I shall be trying them again but it also occurred to me that this is a really handy pancake recipe for anyone with allergies to milk or egg because they were pretty descent pancakes and made only of flour and water. Amazing!

Chinese pancakes (makes 16)

250g plain flour
1 teaspoon caster sugar
Sesame oil

Put the flour and sugar in a large bowl with 190ml of boiling water and stir to a soft, sticky dough. Knead it until it is very smooth. Rest for 30 minutes. Roll it into a sausage then divide it into 16 pieces. Roll each piece into a little ball. Taking two balls at a time, flatten both, brush one surface with oil then press them together with the oil between. Roll out into a 8-10cm pancake with two layers. Heat the oil in a frying pan then cook the pancake for 1 minute on each side until they are puffed up and just beginning to colour. Whilst still very hot, peel the two layers apart to make 2 pancakes. Repeat.