Plums

 Isn't it wonderful to have abundant fruit trees everywhere you turn in this city? It's even better when there's a free-for-all pair of plum trees less than a mile away. On Sunday, Justin and I went to pillage the plum trees in preparation for the inaugural annual canning rituals. Someone had beat us to the low-hanging fruit so Justin, brave as he is, pulled himself up a small cliff holding onto ivy vines to get to the higher branches. Then he tossed each plum individually down to me to bag up. Truly a team effort!

Honey-ginger plum jam.

Today, I boiled and peeled and mashed and stirred those plums into a jammy slurry and canned my first* bounty of the season. Seven half-pints ain't too shabby.

*Technically the refrigerator pickle and dilly beans were the first but I forwent the water bath canning and opted for a simpler approach.