There could be plums...

It might have seemed an odd concept to be selling plum produce on Apple Day last week.  But you see, even though the apple harvest has been the worst in fifteen years, it has been a very good year for plums.  And I am very impressed by our local independent greengrocers who have introduced a pick and mix approach.  You can end up with a assortment of plums, purple, golden and blue, with even the odd damson and greengage sneaking in: a bursting bagful of luscious jewel coloured fruit.

For the plum mincemeat recipe, I needed russet which again both Broadway Fruiterer and the Clock Tower Stores in Crouch End were able to provide.  This is the first of three recipes which honour three long standing divas of the kitchen: Pam the Jam from River Cottage, Delia and Mary Berry.  I had a slight problem with marketing my chutney as 'Delia's Plum Chutney' since several people asked me, if I was Delia. My mother always used to say Delia was my father's other woman, so you can see how monumentally she featured in my family life.  Mary Berry, precise,pleasant and seriously picky, is now a legend due to the Great Bake-Off.

Anyhow here's the recipes.

Delia's Plum Chutney

Since this comes from an old cookbook with a youthful page-boyed Delia on the cover, here's the original.  She attributes the recipe to an unknown great-grandmother, all part of its mysterious provenance.

Pam Corbin's Plum Mincemeat
1 kg plums
zest and juice of 2-3 oranges
500g Russet apples, peeled, cored and chopped 
200g currants
200g raisins
200g sultanas
100g orange marmalade
250g demerara sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 nutmeg, freshly grated
50ml ginger cordial, optional
100g chopped walnuts
50ml brandy or sloe gin

Makes 4 x 450g jars


Stone the plums, and cook them with the orange juice until tender. Blend in an electric processor or push through a sieve - you should end up with around 700ml plum puree.

Put into a large bowl with all of the other ingredients except the brandy or sloe gin. Cover and leave to stand overnight or for 12 hours.

Bake in a large baking dish for 2 to 21/2 hours at 130 deg C or Gas Mark 1/2. Remove from the oven, stir in the brandy or sloe gin, then pot into warm, sterilised jars, making sure there are no air pockets.

Store in a dry, dark place ready for Christmas. Use within 12 months


From Pam Corbin's Rivercottage Preserves Book, and published on www.jamjarshop.com

The final recipe follows on from the previous because let's face it, why make mince pies when you can buy them so cheap?  (No! No! No!) But if fiddling with pastry cases is too much then use the mincemeat to make Mary Berry's mincemeat loaf cake.  

Mary Berry covers all bases here by calling her recipe a loaf cake, a good tip because if the cake is too dry, stick some butter on it and call it a loaf!  She also reckons the ingredients will produce two cakes, but I found they turned out rather small. This is certainly because they didn't rise and you might want to add teaspoon of baking soda, when you sieve the dry ingredients.

I would also suggest committing to baking one cake and use a larger tin.

Mary Berry's Mincemeat Loaf Cakes

MAKES 2 LOAF CAKES

• 150g soft butter
• 150g light muscovado sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 225g self-raising flour

• 225g mincemeat
• 100g currants
• 100g sultanas
• 50g blanched split almonds

1. Preheat the oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3. Grease two 450g loaf tins (top measurement 17cm x 11cm) and line with baking parchment. 
2. 
   
3. Measure all the ingredients, except for the almonds, into a large bowl and beat well until thoroughly blended. Turn into the prepared loaf tins and level out evenly. Arrange the almonds on top of each cake mixture.
4. 
   
5. Bake in the preheated oven for about 1¼ hours or until the cakes are golden brown, firm to the touch and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
6. 
   
7. Allow the cakes to cool in the tins for a few minutes, then loosen the sides with a small palette knife, turn out on to a wire rack and leave to cool. 
8. 
   

TIP Making 2 loaf cakes at a time means you have one for now and one to freeze – often a life-saver when friends arrive without warning.

PREPARING AHEAD The cakes will keep for up to one week if wrapped tightly in clingfilm and stored in an airtight container. Or wrap the cakes and freeze for up to 2 months.

First published in YOU, Mail on Sunday

Leaf Litter - Pick it up!

Through Autumn's golden gown we used to kick our way

You always loved this time of year

Those fallen leaves lie undisturbed now

Cause you're not here.. 

At this time of year when I see piles of leaves on the footpath, I often hum these few lines from the Moody Blues.  Sometimes I even kick the leaves a little. Yet they are only the 'golden gown' of the song for a few days.  After festering on the street, they become sodden, brackish and manky and they stick to the soles of your shoes, and you check to see, if perhaps you stood in something very unpleasant, which you've now brought into the house, but you haven't.

Actually the whole process is very good, even the dog dirt (not in your house obviously). Because the leaves are a supreme source of nourishment and in a year's time if stored nicely, you will be plunging your hand into your hessian bag and coming up with a fistful of dark, rich compost which crumbles like chocolate fudge cake. Yum. 



The leaf mould  can now can be scattered on beds and around trees which love this kind of mushroomy mulch, because it reminds them of the forests where they once grew. And of course it's all free.

Mulching trees in Stationers Park

Which is why I am sorry that all those lovely piles of leaf letter that Veolia leave in their jolly purple bags to be collected will end up.... in a furnace.  From ash to ash.  The reason is that once the leaves are combined with the effluvia we find on the streets (plastic wrappings, sweet papers, metal ring pulls, road grit), they are considered contaminated.  Regrettably a natural resource has now become a waste product.

I don't blame Veolia in this. The Environmental Agency are conducting trials into using street sweeping of leaves to make compost, but not in an urban context.  In general the advice from the EA is clear: 'leaf  fall has always been classified a non-recyclable waste.' (www.mrw.co.uk)  

There again, it is our fault that we leave litter on the street and it does not make sense for large companies to employ people to scour piles of leaves to remove small items. It is a question of scale. 

However on a small scale, we can do something local.  The next work day for the Stationers Park Park Volunteer Group is on Friday 9 November, 1-5pm and we will be collecting the fallen leaves, bagging them up and storing them for next year.  We will also be combining them with grass cuttings produced when Richard scythed the borders of the water feature. The grass cuttings accelerate the process, as the leaves rot.  

This will be in a couple of weeks so let's hope we get lots of lovely leaves before then.  (And we'll be celebrating the re-opening of Reg the park keeper's hut with a cup of tea and cake!)