Things To Do With Plums :: Chinese Plum Sauce

Having had such success with the jam, and with buckets of plums coming off the tree, my next effort was something more savoury - Chinese Plum Sauce.  I got the recipe from the Food.com website (posted by Dancer) and I will go through it step-by-step, like I did for the apricot jam, because it is a good resource for me to look back to, should I decide to make it again.

Ingredients:
8 cups of blood plums, chopped and stoned (1.6kg before chopping & stoning)
1 cup of onions, diced (I used a Spanish onion, but white ones would do)
1 cup water (I would use 1/2 cup next time)
1 teaspoon ginger root, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
3/4 cup castor sugar
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1 teaspoon ground coriander seeds
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon whole cloves

First, I cut up the plums and took the stones out.  This is a very "juicy" business, so it's a good idea to have an old and very absorbent table cloth or towel underneath the chopping board, as well as having paper towels on hand to mop up the juice every two or three plums.



Eight cups of chopped plums fills two large jugs.  So, knowing this, next time I won't bother with the measuring cup.



Next, I washed the jars and lids in hot, soapy water and rinsed them well.  Then I put all the jars and other equipment into the hot water bath and brought it to the boil for at least ten minutes.





Then, I put the plums, onions, garlic, ginger and water in a big pot, covered it and brought it to the boil.  Then I reduced heat and simmered until the plums and onions were very tender (about 30 minutes).  NB:  As mentioned in the ingredients section, I will reduce the water to 1/2 cup next time, as it took a long time to reduce the sauce to a good consistency, later on.


A couple of days ago, Lizzy came with me to Spotlight (she drove, of course!) to find a nice fabric for the jar covers for this sauce.  Lizzy found this lovely red and gold paisley design - SO suitable to a Chinese sauce!  While the plums & onions were cooking, I cut out all the covers.



After the plums & onions had become nice and soft, I strained them.  I did this in two stages, first through a colander to get out all the bigger lumps, and then through a strainer.  It seems like twice the work, but it made the strainer part a lot quicker and easier.



Then I returned the sauce to the stove in a clean pan and added the sugar, vinegar, coriander seeds, salt, cinnamon and cayenne pepper.  I put the lid on and brought it to the boil and then reduced the heat to a high simmer with the lid off until it has reduced to about half its volume and the consistency of apple sauce (about 45 minutes to 1 hour).  If I had used half the water, as I intend to next time, this will have taken quite a bit less time, I imagine.

Then, using sterile tongs, I took all the jars, lids, ladel and funnel out of the hot water bath and stood them on clean paper towel.  I realised, then that the red, wide-mouthed funnel that I had used for the jams would not fit into these smaller jars and had to quickly sterilize a smaller funnel to use.

Then it was time to start ladelling!  I love this bit!  The quantities of this recipe almost filled four of these 300ml jars.



Once the jars were filled, I put the lids on quite tight and processed three of them in the hot water bath for 30 minutes.  After I had taken them out to cool, it was fun listening for the little buttons on the lids to pop down as they vacuum-sealed.  I put the fourth jar in the fridge to use straight away.

After the jars had cooled and I had checked that they were vacuum-sealed, I put the labels, covers and ribbons on them.  I was very happy with this sauce and the next day made it again with double quantities and half the water, which worked really well.  I now have twelve jars of Chinese plum sauce - plenty for the whole year!

We will use it with all sorts of dishes.  Wayne used it to marinate some pork spare ribs the first night after I made it and the family said it was very good!  Being vegan, I didn't really want the pork myself, but I had some of the sauce on my rice and peas and really liked it too!  The next night, we had it as a dipping sauce with some home-made spring rolls and tonight we are having it on roast duck.  I think that will be enough plum sauce for one week!