Its Monday and here is another recipe that I've been using lately. I just finished the final batch of plums from my sister's. I've spent over a week canning nothing but plums for goodness sake!
This can work for purple plums, nectarines, peaches or any other stone fruit.
8 Cups of prepared fruit
4 Cups of Sugar
1 tsp of Cinnamon
1/4 tsp of ground cloves
1/4 tsp of ground nutmeg
Wash and chopped plums...
Put it in a large heavy bottomed pot.
Cook them until soft enough to do this...
Put them through a food mill over another pot.
You end up with this sunny yellow plum sauce!
Add sugar...
Look in you handy dandy Flavor Bible and see what spices you want to put in your syrup...
WHAT you don't have a Flavor Bible? Well if you are even a slightly adventurous cook you will love this book. I looked up 'plums' and it gave me a huge list of ingredients and spices that go well with them.
For my jam I chose vanilla, for this syrup I chose cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg...all on the list.
I do seriously recommend this book...hundreds of pages of delicious combinations for your tummy! I did a in depth review over at Not Dabbling in Normal if you want to read it.
You can either reduce you syrup by stirring it over low heat for a long time until it is the desired consistency. Or you can bring it up to a full and rip roaring boil till it reaches the syrup point which is 230 degrees F. or 110 degrees C. This is the route I chose since I had a lot of plums and not a lot of time to be standing around supervising a slow simmering pot of fruit all day.
After it is cooked whisk in your spices.
Put it into hot pint jars and process in a hot water bath for 20 minutes
It is incredibly scrumptious. The tart of the plums melded with the warm flavors of the spices makes for a rich syrup to use on pancakes, or oatmeal or even ice cream!
I love to see the itty bitty bits of spice floating so lazily around in the syrup. If I can get a hols of some organic peaches I will certainly be using this recipe on them too!
So what is your favorite fruit flavor combinations?
Maybe raspberry with almond...or strawberry with cream...or maybe even peach with brown sugar.
Do tell and maybe I will can it!
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I'm also over at Not Dabbling in Normal today talking about bartering for goods and services...or how I got free applesauce this year with on little power tool!
