Perfect Plum Jam

I saw them at the market, beautiful purple prune plums. I bought two containers each was 1.5 litres and ended up at about 12 cups before I cut them for processing.

That's how all my stories begin these days. When the harvest season arrives, I get over excited and anxious at the same time. I know it will be a year before my Ontario Farmers can dazzle me with their beautiful locally grown produce, and like a child I dance the outside aisles with joy gladly opening my wallet to pay for all the bounty. There is such excitement in preserving things you can only get once a year. These plums can be cooked down without any pectin, just plums, sugar, a little water and let the heat do all the work. I puree the skins into the jam when it is cooked down. It ended up tasting like a prune puree, it is so delicious. In the winter I will probably make a dipping sauce from it. I like preserving one ingredient rather than an entire jar of plum sauce for dipping, so I can use the plums for other things as well, like cake layers or just for toast.

Ok, I know it sounds way too romantic to talk like this but I am in the autumn of my life and each season is a gift of time, this season is one that may not be there next year and therefore must be squeezed for all its worth. I find that preserving that moment just like a picture preserves that moment and gives me deep satisfaction. 

Age makes you philosophical about everything, age gives you the time to appreciate the good and the beautiful, age gives you remorse for the losses and the squander of things and opportunities you wish you could do again. So this old girl lives in the moment and I choose the gifts of that moment above other thoughts and lesser things.

Here is the link to a safe recipe for canning plums for the winter. The cold snow blowing wind howling turn on the fireplace winter:

http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_07/plum_preserves.html

~Hugs from Mum