The first homemade jam I ever tasted was made with homegrown plums. I was just four or five years old and the trees in our backyard were having a bumper year. My mom picked enough to fill her yellow enamel colander, gave them a good rinse under the tap, and turned them in sweet, slightly drippy preserves. We ate those plums over pancakes and with oatmeal every chance we got.
Though I will often tell people that blueberries are my foundational fruit (and they were the star in my very first solo batch of jam), there is something about the flavor of plum jam that makes my brain go, “ah yes, THIS is what homemade jam should taste like.”
I recently made my first batch of plum jam for this season (I was asked by Anolon gourmet cookware to develop this particular recipe), from the same kind of sturdy black plums that used to grow in our southern California yard. I added a little ground cardamom for extra depth and I cooked the whole thing in the 7.5 quart wide stock pot from the Anolon Advanced line. Though I don’t normally gravitate towards non-stick cookware for jam making, the width and low walls of the pan made it irresistible.
Disclosure: This is a sponsored post (hopefully that was clear before you got to this disclosure statement). Anolon has compensated me for the creation of the plum jam recipe. They sent me the stockpot in which I made the jam (I did really like it, though), and they’re providing the cookware set for the giveaway. The thoughts and words are still all entire mine.
Plum Cardamom Jam
Ingredients
- 5 pounds plums
- 4 cups granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cardamom
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
Instructions
- Wash plums well and cut them in half to remove pits. Slice the plums into thin half moons and heap them into a low, wide pan.
- Add the sugar and stir to combine. Cover the pan and let the plums macerate for at least an hour.
- When the plums are quite juicy and most of the sugar has dissolved, remove the cover from the pan and place it on the stove.
- Add the cardamom and lemon juice and bring the fruit to a boil.
- Cook the fruit at a controlled boil, stirring regularly, for 30 to 40 minutes, until the plums soften and the syrup thickens. You’ll know when the jam is done because it will become more resistant to stirring, and when you pull the spoon out of the pan, the droplets will be thick and slow moving.
- While the plums cook, prepare a boiling water bath canner and 8 half pint jars.
- When the jam is done, remove the pan from the heat. Funnel it into the prepared jars.
- Wipe the rims, apply the heated lids and clean rings, and process the closed jars in a boiling water bath canner for 10 minutes (do not start your timer until the pot returns to a full, rolling boil).
- Once the time is up, remove the jars from the canner and set them on a folded kitchen towel to cool. The lids should seal promptly and will often make a pinging or popping sound as the vacuum forms. When the jars are sealed, the center of the lids will be concave and when pressed, the lid will not move or wiggle.
Amazingly delicious–plum jam is my favorite now, I think. I also added the zest of one orange and a few tablespoons of orange juice and it’s fantastic. And I processed the cooked jam through a food mill before canning. Gives the jam a silky texture. This may be in the top 5 foods I’ve ever made.
Your additions sound delicious!
Soooo delicious and beautiful! Mine took a little longer to get to the proper gelling stage, but worth the wait. I love the taste of the cardamom with the plums.
So glad you like it!
I just finished making this recipe. I tasted it in the pot and it tasted great. I have not tried the cooled jam yet, since it’s still smoking hot in the jars. I bought and weighed, both in the store and on my home scale, 5 lbs of Italian prune plums. I followed the recipe exactly, cutting into half moons, letting the fruit mascerate in the sugar for an hour, adding coriander and fresh squeezed lemon. However, this is where things went sideways. My jam pot was half full of liquid. I took over 3 hours to boil it down to a thick-ish consistency. I still think it was a bit on the thin side, but I was tired of standing and stirring. After the first couple of hours it started to burn to the bottom in spots, so I stirred pretty much constantly for the last hour. The plums literally disappeared. It looked almost like thick syrup. I’m sure it’s going to be tasty, but I was hoping to use it for filling in my family’s Berliner recipe. I’ll have to see how thick the jam is when it’s cooled. It made a total of 5 half pints.
Did you have it running at a hard boil? I’m really surprised that it was like water after three hours of boiling. That much boiling should have reduced it to nothing.
My current favorite pan is a very large (14″?) non stick skillet we picked up at a friend’s yard sale. We can cook 3 over easy eggs at once or pan fry a large quantity of anything. Our cast iron skillets are not as large and my 30 year old wok is not flat, though they have also been favorites in the past.
My stainless steel GreenPan stock pot. My mom and I use it every summer to make all different kinds of jam. We then share our jam with family and friends during the holiday season.
Definitely, my skillet
My favorite piece of cookware is my Le Creuset oven we got as a wedding present! We use it for everything.
My favorite is my soup pot. I use it for making soups, beer, and spaghetti sauce. It gets a work-out all year.
well if a grill/smoker grate counts, thats it.. if not the very same skillet listed ^
My current favorite piece of cookware is a 10″ cast iron skillet that was passed down to my hubby from his great grandmother. So many things have been cooked in it over the years. It is just so versatile.
Love my revere ware, my Moms older and heavier are even better.
Definitely my LeCreuset 12″ skillet. Use it every day.
Cast iron skillet.
My favorite piece of cookware is my 12 inch cast iron skillet. From stovetop to oven easily and the even heat is a joy.
Your jam looks wonderful.
My fave is an old strainer I inherited from my grandmother. It’s falling apart and I’ve been looking for a suitable replacement for ages. So far, nothing is quite right.
I like the assortment of cast iron skillets we have.
My favorite piece is my Le Creuset dutch oven.
my dutch oven
My favorite piece is my lodge dutch oven 🙂
My most used item is a 2 qt sauce pan!
My favorite piece of cookware is my dutch oven. I use it for just about everything from soups to jams!
I just got a great nonstick omelette pan that is my new favorite!
I love a stockpot. It’s just so utilitarian!
My favourites are and always have been a collection of dutch ovens, small and large. I cook, roast, and bake in them. Thank you!
I may have to adjust my farmer’s market agenda to pick up some plums; I think that the color alone persuaded me!
Anyhow, my favorite is a big Le Creuset pot that my husband and I use all the time to make stews, pasta sauce, jam, whatever…I hesitated about purchasing that thing for so long, but it was so worth it. I am hoping to make some plum butter in it this weekend!
Favorite piece of cookware – has to be the amazingly versatile dutch oven. Don’t know what I ever did in the kitchen without one!
My favorite piece of cookware is my calphalon saute pan. I got it in college and it’s still the best piece, I use it for everything. That plum recipe looks beautiful!
Even though I can’t enter, I had to comment on that beautiful jam you made!! I’m going to try may hand at some with Cardamom in it too!!!
My favorite piece of cookware is an old cast aluminum HealthTec dutch oven. I found it in my second husband’s garage when I moved in after our wedding. It was the first thing I packed into my car when I moved, many years later!!! I’ve baked a chicken, made jam, simmered soup & fried eggs in that thing. The lid fits so well that you can put soup on to simmer & turn the stove down so low it’s just barely on & go out into the garden for the day & it won’t go dry. I quickly browned a pork roast it once & forgot to turn it totally off before I went out. It simmered all day long with the stove just barely on like a slow cooker & presented me with a roast that fell apart when I got home. The only things I use in my kitchen now that I’m old & single are that pot, a non-stick skillet for stir fry, my Foreman Grill & the slow cooker.
my cast iron skillets that belonged to my mother are my favorite. I use them daily.
I was excited to see this website as I was looking for more recipes to use up gallons of plums and blackberries in my kitchen. New pans couldn’t hurt! My Ebbleskiver pan…cast iron WITH the lip is my all-time favorite.
Not sure how I got by before acquiring my cast iron skillet; I use it on a near daily basis!
This past year, it has been a shallow le creuset roasting pan. I throw cut veggies in there w/ any seasoning & it roasts them perfectly.
8″ Cast Iron skillet, for sure. It was one of the first pieces of new cookware I bought for myself, back in 2004, and it’s come with me to every house I’ve lived in since.
My favorite is my medium nonstick skillet. It’s showing some wear though! Also, my favorite jam out of all the ones I have made is Plum Amaretto–the Plum Cardamom one looks delicious!
I love my iron skillet! Can’t make pineapple upside down cake without it!!
My absolute favorite is a large iron skillet my mother in law bought me from a yard sale. It makes the best upside down pineapple cake ever!
My big french oven, I can make soups, jam, anything in it!
My favorite is an old oblong covered Le Creuset baker. Right size, weight…everything!
love plums- but love blueberries more. would love summer jam in February. Plum ain’t too shabby either: though peach and lemon thyme sounds appealing to me right now….
My cast iron skillet – you can fry, bake, roast, shimmy – whatever you choose!
Just got a new cast iron camp dutch oven from Lodge. Cant wait to try out some of the recipies! 🙂
We “splurged” on a mini-food processor as a present to ourselves at Christmas, and it seems like we use it almost every day! That baby does everything. Thank you for the chance to win! I stumbled across your blog today on a hunt for pear butter instructions, and over the course of this afternoon I think I’ve spent at least 3 hours here reading. Thank you!
My current favorite is my dutch oven. Lovely and so many uses!
I love my Staub Dutch oven!
My favorite piece of cookware is my dutch oven. So very versatile!
If I had to choose a favorite I think it would be my stock pot. I love making soups and stews even in the summer (works great for chicken and dumplings too!)
First, this recipe looks AMAZING…I am a plum lover and anything with cardamom is a bonus. My favorite piece of cookware is a toss up between my echo-friendly dutch oven and my wok. Both have gotten my husband and I through several moves, several tight-spaced kitchens and several wonderful meals. Cheers!
My current favorite is a Calphalon griddle pan. Perfect size to make an egg sandwich.