Plum Season and favourite recipes from the orchard kitchen

They are in the shops now, the first of the English plums, plum season has arrived so to celebrate here at The Orchard Year  these are a few of our favourite recipes.

Plum Crumble:

 Everyone's favourite and you've probably all got your own recipe for this. But just in case, or if you fancy a change, here is our crumble topping recipe:
3ozs butter, 4 tablespoons self raising flour, 2 big handfulls of porridge oats, 4 tablespoons of cane sugar.
(I feel strongly that cane sugar always works much better than white with plums)
You know what to do don't you, rub the flour with the butter etc, etc

Plum Tarte Tatin:

 

 1 packet ready made puff pastry, enough half de-stoned plums to line dish, 3ozs butter, 4 tablespoons cane sugar

Melt the butter in a thick bottomed frying pan or stove top / oven proof dish, sprinkle sugar evenly and add plum halves, cut side down. Cook on a medium heat for about 20 minutes until the juices are bubbling then remove from heat.
Now if you've had to use the frying pan transfer the plums to an ovenproof dish, reserving the syrup. If you're already using the ovenproof dish drain the syrup into another bowl carefully keeping the plums in place.
Roll the pastry into a circle slightly larger than your dish then place it on top of the plums, tucking the edges of the pastry into the dish around the fruit to form an upside down tart case.
Bake in a preheated oven  (gas mark 6, 200 deg C) until the pastry is golden brown and the juices are bubbling, about 35 minutes.
Leave to cool for about an hour before turning the tarte tatin onto a serving dish. With all that butter it'll turn out quite easily with a little help from a spatula around the edges.
To serve,warm the reserved syrup for pouring.

Barbados Cream is also good with plums.

Barbados Cream:

 So easy to make, you'll need -

1 carton of thick Greek yoghurt (like Total), 1 carton double cream, cane demerara sugar and a shallow dish.
Simply mix equal qtys of cream and yoghurt and pour into the dish. Sprinkle with a thick layer of the sugar. Cover with cling film and refrigerate overnight.
Delicious!

So get down to your nearest farm shop this weekend and buy yourself a few lbs / kilos of plums, remember to buy more than you need for cooking as you're bound to eat a few in the car on the way home.