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.

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.

Winter Warmer

To the tune of Let It Snow, with apologies to Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne:

When the weather outside is frightful,You can make a meal that's delightful.
Just cook something low and slow
And let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

With the accumulated snowage rapidly approaching a crazy foot and a half here in Portland and the relentless drumbeat of Christmas throbbing in my ears, I'm deep in comfort mode. And around here that means chunks of meat and vegetables simmered for hours in stock and wine. So when I saw a recipe for a beef stew with prunes on Mark Bittman's blog, Bitten, I knew it would come in handy this week.

Skijoring in Vermont. My question is: they see a bunny, then what?

His recipe called for chuck which, like pork shoulder, oxtail, ham hocks and other "less-desirable" cuts of meat, can feed a crowd (or be eaten over several days) for not much money without sacrificing on the flavor front. Plus, when the social luster of your family is wearing thin after being house-bound for a week together and you run into your neighbors skijoring through the streets with their dogs, you'll have this in your back pocket to lure them to your dinner table.

Beef Stew With Prunes

3 Tbsp. olive oil
2 lbs. lean boneless beef, preferably chuck, in 2-inch cubes
Salt and pepper to taste
1 onion, peeled and chopped
3 plum tomatoes, stemmed and chopped (canned are fine)
1 tsp. sweet paprika, more to taste
1 cinnamon stick
1 bay leaf
1 c. chicken stock
1 c. dry red wine
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 c. pitted prunes
1 Tbsp. sherry vinegar or other vinegar, or to taste
Chopped parsley leaves for garnish

Place a deep skillet or casserole that can be covered over medium-high heat, and add oil. Brown meat well on all sides, seasoning with salt and pepper, for 10 minutes; remove with a slotted spoon.

In same pot over medium-high heat, sauté onion and tomatoes with a large pinch of salt and some pepper. When they soften, about 5 minutes, stir in paprika, cinnamon, and bay leaf. Return meat to pan, and add stock and wine; bring to a boil, then lower heat, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes. If mixture starts to dry, add a little water or stock.

Remove cinnamon and bay leaf, and stir in sugar and prunes. Simmer until prunes and meat are soft, another 30 to 45 minutes. (Dish can be made in advance to this point; let sit for a few hours, or cover and refrigerate for up to a day before reheating and proceeding.) When meat is very tender, uncover pot and add vinegar; if necessary, raise heat so sauce thickens and becomes glossy. Season to taste with salt and pepper, and serve hot, garnished with parsley. Excellent with polenta, couscous or saffron rice.