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

End of season tomato chutney

I mentioned earlier how I had made Nigel Slater's mixed tomato chutney, a combination of green and red tomatoes.  This weekend I cleared the last of the tomato plants from my own garden and the tyre garden I helped create at our local community centre.  With the recent sunny weather, a few of the most recalcitrant tomatoes managed to ripen nicely.  The community garden tomatoes had self-seeded from interesting varieties, which included some black tomatoes.  This all made for an interesting mix of colours and sweet and sour flavours.  On the down side, the ripe tomatoes rather had a tendency to burst, which meant it was impossible to scald them to remove the skins.  Never mind, this is a rustic chutney.

Ingredients
900g tomatoes, green and red
350g onions
90g raisins
250g light muscovado sugar
300ml white wine vinegar
1 medium sized, hot red chilli
1tsp of sald
2tsp of yellow mustard seeds (for my recipe I used brown)

Yield: I made twice the amount above and made just over 12 x 8oz jars of chutney. 

Cut up the tomatoes without peeling. 

Put the green fruit together with the peeled and roughly chopped onions, into a large stainless steel or enamelled pan, with the raisins, sugar, chilli, salt, mustard seeds and vinegar.

Bring to boil, turn down the heat, and leave to simmer for an one hour, giving an occasional stir to reduce the risk of the chutney sticking.

Note after about 25 minutes, add the ripe tomatoes and continue to simmer. until thick and golden brown.  Remove the bag of chillies.

Spoon into sterilised jars, and seal.

Everywoman's Autumn Chutney

This is the next in a series of recipes that I have used to capitalise on the abundance that is so much part of autumn.  The downside of abundance of course, is waste and it hurts me to see apples lying unused, even crab apples from urban trees. And  I refuse to ditch our copious crop of green tomatoes, just because they won't ripen. When the blight comes, I act fast.

So these recipes capture the joy of celebrating harvest, and at the same time combat waste.  The apples, a key ingredient, have come from different sources, but none of them, a shop or even (as if!) a supermarket.  They have been apples not good enough to sell in the Church Farm veg and fruit box.  They have been scrumped from ancient trees by River Stour in Dorset, (actually just by an arboretum), or  a hedgerow in the National Trust property, Dyrham Hall.  Or they have been come from gardens: a colleague's at work and my brother's in Wales.  You can see this splendid specimen below.

Because it just uses fruit and omits onions, this particular chutney is deliciously sweet and sticky.  And it is another instance of using up food waste, in this case three veg and fruit boxes which were not picked up by members of the Church Farm scheme.  The pears were at the hard and crunchy stage which made them ideal, while the tomatoes were at their ripest; the apples were cookers from a colleague's garden. 


The recipe below comes from 'The Preserving Book' mentioned before but I would also like to quote what Katie Stewart in her introduction. She recommends making 'the standard recipe exactly if it is a first time brew of chutney but after a little experience, vary the fruit and vegetables used or change the quantity or mixture of spices'.  So, rather than going out to buy the correct sugar and spices, I actually resorted to using up store cupboard inredients.  This means my version will not be the same as hers and if you try the recipe, your chutney won't be the same either.  On the other hand, you now have permission to tweak. 

Go on, try it out and come up with your own Autumn chutney!

Ingredients
1kg (2lbs) cooking apples
500g (1lb) pears
750g (1.5lb) red tomatoes
125g (4oz) seedless raisins
125g (4oz) sultanas
1kg (2lb)soft brown sugar
625 (1pint) vinegar
1/2 teaspoon ground mace
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon salt
1tablespoon salt
15g (1/2oz) salt
12 red chillies


Yield: about 2.5kg (5lbs)

Peel the apples and pears, core and cut into small pieces. Skin the tomatoes and chop them.

Put the apples, pears, tomatoes and all the remaining ingredients into a preserving pan.  Stir well and simmer for 2 hours until tender, golden brown and thick.  Stir occasionally to prevent  sticking.

Put into hot jars, cover and seal.

Green tomatoes are hot!

My husband knows about gardening and he says growing tomatoes outside in this country is hard, even in 'Mediterranean' London..  If you have a greenhouse, they ripen beautifully but maybe there just isn't enough sun to turn those tiny green nodules into little red bombs that explode in your mouth. I plan to follow a friend's advice and pack them in a drawer with a red tomato or a banana, to see if they turn....


But in the meantime, I love making green tomato chutney.  Last year I tried Niger Slater's recipe with red and green tomatoes but in the end I preferred this one, which commits to using only the green, but adds apples. This last ingredient seems essential to create the desired gloopiness of a perfect chutney.


The recipe comes from  'The Preserving Book' published by Pan, which I found in a charity shop in Bath and which I imagine is now out of print.   It was written in the seventies, when people were able to get  home brew sets from Boots and 'The Good Life' was on the TV.  The writers are farmer's wives and stalwarts in the WI; the only male contributor (naturally) is responsible for the chapter on wine making and beer-making.


The addition of the ginger and chillies makes the taste of this chutney initially warm and then quite fiery, but complements the green tomatoes, which can be bitter.  I have to say I used birds eye chillies and had cold feet about keeping the bag in the mix for all of the cooking. Taste the chutney as it simmers and make your own decision.  The recipe says, simmer for one hour but mine took longer.  As in all chutney recipes, it is better to overcook than undercook.


Ingredients
2kg (4lbs) green tomatoes
500g (1lb) cooking apples
750g (1.5lb) onions, chopped
250g (8oz) seedless raisins
500g (1lb) soft brown sugar
625 (1pint) vinegar
15g (1/2oz) ginger
15g (1/2oz) salt
12 red chillies


Yield: about 3.5kg (7lbs)


Cut up the tomatoes without peeling.  Peel and core the apples and chop them.

Put all the tomatoes, apples and raisins into the preserving pan.  Add the sugar, vinegar and salt. Tie the chillies in piece of muslin and suspend in the pan.  Bring to boil, stir well and simmer for one hour, until thick and golden brown.  Remove the bag of chillies.

Put into hot jars, cover and seal.

A great apple chutney recipe

This recipe comes from 'Easy Jam, Chutneys and Preserves' by Val and John Harrison.  John has excellent 'waste lady' credentials, having also written, 'Low-Cost Living' and 'The Essential Allotment Guide'. 

They claim that you can say that this is a secret family recipe and certainly the feedback I got was very positive.  I did however make a couple of tweaks. I prefer to use cider vinegar rather than malt; Waitrose Essentials range offer a reasonably priced version, just under a pound.  I also used Church Farm apples, which were a mix of cookers and eaters, with some cidery ones.. Would the recipe work so well with windfalls from the apple trees in my local park?  It's worth trying.

The most expensive ingredient was the two packets of Schwartz pickling spice and I intend to research recipes for this and consider buying in bulk.  More details to follow.

Chutneys are best eaten after two months when the flavour will have improved.  They will keep for up to a year, but only if the jars have been sterilized.  The easiest and simplest way to do this is to place the jars upright on a baking sheet with the lids beside them in a low oven for about ten minutes or so.

One final piece of advice. I originally intended making this recipe after a convivial night out with friends, full of confidence and joie de vivre.  Don't.  When I did embark on the recipe the next day, it took three hours to make the chutney.  It takes all that time to absorb every drop of water and the chutney is all the better for it.  You can see how the chutney reduces and changes colour in the pictures below.

Apple Chutney

Ingredients

900g (2lb) cooking apples
225g (8oz) onions
225g (8oz) sultanas or raisins
1 teaspoon salt
855ml (1.5 pints) distilled malt (white) vinegar
56g (2oz) mixed pickling spice
2 teaspoons ground ginger
450g (1lb) soft brown sugar

Method

Peel, core and slice the apples.  Peel and chop the onions.

Put the apples, onions, raisins or sultanas and salt into a pan with vinegar.  Tie the pickling spice in the muslin bag and add to the pan. Bring to the boil and reduce the heat and simmer until tender.  Remove the spice and add the ginger.

Add the sugar, stir until it has dissolved, and continue to simmer until chutney is thick, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.

Pot into hot, clean, sterilized jars immediately and seal.Label with contents once fully cooled.