End of Summer Prune Crisp (Yes…Prune. Not Plum!)

Planted as street trees all over Portland in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Italian prunes were as synonymous with this city as the rose is today. By 1927, one source indicates, there were 55,000 acres of Italian prunes growing on farms in Oregon and Clark County, Washington. Despite the efforts of marketing types to rebrand them as plums—prunes being associated with the dried fruit used by elderly folk to aid…um…digestion—they are being grown by farmers all over the state to this day.

I love eating them out of hand and spitting out the pits (yes, I'm still five years old), but I also love them in desserts. The Italian prune crisp pictured above is one of my favorites, plucked, if you will, from my mother's 1950s-era Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook. So simple, it just involves pitting and slicing the fruit, sprinkling it with cinnamon and a mixture of flour, butter and sugar, then popping it the oven. The perfect no-muss, no-fuss, one-pan "modern housewife's" recipe.

Click here for more information on the history of these prunes in Oregon.

Italian Prune Crisp

For the filling:
4-6 c. Italian prunes, pitted and quartered
3/4 c. sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 c. water or fruit liqueur like cassis, triple sec, etc.

For the topping:
3/4 c. flour
1 c. sugar
1/3 c. butter or margarine

Preheat oven to 350°.

Place fruit in 9" by 12" pyrex baking dish. Sprinkle with sugar, cinnamon and salt. Drizzle with water or liqueur.

Put flour, sugar and margarine in bowl of food processor. Pulse until the consistency of cornmeal. (If doing by hand, blend by hand with a metal pastry blender.) Sprinkle evenly over fruit. Bake for 40 min. or until bubbling.

Farm Bulletin: Life's a Bowl of…Prunes? Pt. 2

In Part Two of this Farm Bulletin, contributor Anthony Boutard of Ayers Creek Farm discusses the much-maligned prune and shares a unique way of curing the immature green fruit. In Part One he discusses the attributes of sour cherries.

Prunes

The stone fruits have three separate layers surrounding the seed and are what botanists call a drupe. The layers are the skin (exocarp), the pulpy flesh (mesocarp) and the hard layer surrounding the seed (endocarp) that the laity call the stone or pit. These three layers are derived from the mother plant's tissues, whereas the seed inside is the result of the sexual union of the sperm produced by the pollen and the mother plant's egg. The various stone fruit have characteristically shaped endocarps. Cherries have round ones, peaches have a large-pitted version, almonds have a softer corky endocarp, and the plums have a very hard asymmetric pit. The seeds have a characteristic bitter almond flavor, and some are toxic when eaten in large quantities. The Boutards have long eaten the seeds of stone fruit without apparent ill effects. In many parts of Europe, it is customary to include some pits to flavor preserves and eau de vies made from stone fruit, just as Sarah [Minnick of Lovely's 50/50] does with her ice cream.

The plums are the most diverse of the stone fruits in terms of types and flavor. This week, we start with a prune bearing the regal name of Imperial Epineuse. The prunes are a class of related plums with a very high solid content of sugars and fiber, which allows them to dry well. They are prunes no matter whether they are fresh or dried. The commerce in dried prunes originated in Hungary in 16th century and spread westwards into France and Germany. The original seedling of Imperial Epineuse was found in an old monastery near Clairac, France. It was introduced to Oregon in the waning days of the 19th century as a dessert prune under the name of Clairac Mammoth, but never gained a following here. Not sure why, as it is easy to grow and more reliable than any of our other stone fruit. A steady cropper, as the Brits would say. The texture is very fine, and pomologists have suggested that it may have a bit of damson in its background. The skin provides a pleasing and contrasting acidic note.

If you have an over-productive prune in your backyard, you can pick the very young fruit in the spring, before the pit has hardened, and cure them just as you would olives. The whole fruit is edible, no need to pit them, and you use them in dishes just as you would olives. We crack the fruits with a mallet and put them in a jar with water, changing it daily until they turn olive green. Last year, we cured them in lye. The cured plums look no different than cured olives; the lye cured plums are dark just like lye cured olives. Publication 8267 from UC Davis gives good directions. We got the idea for curing plums from a visiting Chicago Chef Paul Kahan, who served up a dish with green peaches cured in the same manner. Greg Higgins and his staff cured gage plums and seasoned them with a Tunisian accent. That is the great part of having visitors to the farm, they always leave a new idea or two as they depart.

Illustration of plums at left by Alois Lunzer from the Brown Brothers Continental Nurseries Catalog, 1909.

Italian Prunes, Oregon History

It is so awesome having dogs. For one thing, they force me to get out and exercise. It helps mitigate the effects of sitting on my duff in front of the computer most of the day, not to mention burning off some of the calories that accrue in writing about food (and, of course, eating it). Plus it gets me out onto the streets where I can survey the latest goings-on from who's remodeling or moving to who's doing some new landscaping (or not).

This time of year is particularly good for taking stock of the bounty available from Portland's street trees. All I have to do is look down, since the sidewalks are littered with walnuts, apples and chestnuts, not to mention my favorite windfall items, Italian prunes.

A fascinating piece of history that I ran across on a research tangent the other day is that we owe the introduction of the Italian prune to Oregon to one Dr. Orlando Pleasant Shields Plummer* (right). Not only does he have a really cool name, he was a medical doctor and professor (and the first dean of the medical school at Willamette University), a telegraph operator and a fruit farmer. He was also elected to both the Portland City Council (1865-66) and the Oregon Legislative Assembly (in 1880 and 1882).

An avid horticulturist, he owned a 20-acre fruit farm in Southwest Portland, planting his first prune trees, a variety called Fellenberg, in the late 1850s. By 1927, one source indicates, there were 55,000 acres of Italian prunes growing on farms in Oregon and Clark County, Washington. Obviously some were also planted in parking strips in my neighborhood, and their fruit makes a mighty fine crisp.

Italian Prune Crisp

For the topping:

1 c. flour

3/4 c. uncooked rolled oats

1 c. brown sugar

1/2 Tbsp. cinnamon

1/2 c. melted butter or margarine

For the fruit:

4-6 c. Italian prunes, pitted and quartered
1 c. sugar

1/4 c. water, triple sec or Cointreau
2 Tbsp. cornstarch

1 tsp. vanilla

Mix together dry ingredients in medium sized bowl. Pour in melted butter or margarine and stir with fork to distribute. When well-mixed and crumbly, scatter on top of fruit in pan (below).

Slice fruit into large mixing bowl. Add sugar, water, cornstarch and vanilla and mix thoroughly. Put in 9” by 12” by 2” baking pan. Scatter topping mixture over the top and bake in 350 degree oven for 50 min. to 1 hr.

* The source for this information is from Corning, Howard M. (1989) "Dictionary of Oregon History," Binfords & Mort Publishing, p. 199. Other sources credit nurseryman Henderson Luelling with the introduction of the Italian prune to the state around the same time.

Prunes or Just Plum Crazy?

Something just snapped in my head, I guess. Maybe it had something to do with that silky blue color that, when smudged, gives way to a midnight blue-black. Or the way they turn a deep ruby when cooked, looking lush and fleshy.

Italian prunes are my latest objet d'affection. And prunes they are, though some wimpy marketing types, because when people hear "prunes" they think "laxatives," are trying to relabel them plums, which they are not, or worse, sugar plums, which is insulting and just plain wrong. It's like what happened with hazelnuts. Which are, as every born and bred Oregonian knows, the humble filbert rebranded to sound more sophisticated. But I digress.

I've made prune tarts. And a crisp. But my favorite so far is a luscious fruit compote that has a light sweetness smoothed over with a layer of brandy, made even more perfect served with a slice of simple-to-make yellow cake alongside. Great for a company-type dessert, even better for breakfast the next morning!

Italian Prune Compote

3 lbs. Italian prunes
3/4 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. brandy

Slice prunes in half and remove pits. Place in medium saucepan with sugar and brandy and bring to a boil. Turn down heat and simmer till tender.

Great Yellow Cake
Adapted from The New Basics Cookbook by Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins

2 c. sugar
4 eggs
1 c. vegetable oil
1 c. dry white wine
2 1/2 c. unbleached flour
1/2 tsp. salt
2 1/4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease and flour two 9-inch cake pans.

Beat the sugar and eggs with an electric mixer on medium speed for 30 seconds. Add oil, wine, flour, salt, baking powder and vanilla. Beat 1 min. Pour batter into prepared pans. Place on middle rack of oven and bake until cake has pulled away from side of pans and knife inserted in center comes out clean, 30 min.

Cool in pans 5 min. Turn onto wire racks and cool completely. Serve as is or top with prune compote. Can also be frosted or stacked and frosted.