Pete’s Plum Sauce
(adapted from a recipe in Jams and Preserves, published by Murdoch Press)
- 1.5kg sour plums, stoned and halved (we used the President plums that we bought last week)
- 500g brown sugar
- 375ml white wine vinegar
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 onion, peeled and grated
- 2 small red chillis, seeded and chopped
- 1 large apple or two small ones, peeled, cored and chopped
- 60ml dark soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons of homemade ginger jam (original recipe used 2 tablespoons peeled and chopped fresh ginger)
- 125ml water
1. Put the chopped, peeled apple into a large stock pot and cover with 125ml water. Cover and simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the apple is soft.
2. Add all the remaining ingredients and bring the mixture to a boil. Simmer for about 45 minutes over a low to medium heat until the sauce is thick and pulpy, stirring frequently.
3. Pass the mixture through a food mill or press it through a coarse sieve. If you’re using a tomato juicer as we did, allow the mix to cool a little prior to processing.
4. Wash the cooking pot, and put the strained sauce back into it. Taste the sauce to see if you’d like it sweeter or more acidic, and adjust accordingly. Simmer over a medium heat, stirring constantly, until the sauce thickens to your liking.
5. Ladle the sauce into sterilised jars, seal well and process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes. Please see our Jam Making Primer for more information. The original instructions suggest that you let the sauce mature for a month before eating, to allow all the flavours to meld.
These quantities make enough plum sauce to fill five to six 300ml jars.
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
Celia, will your recipe for peking duck follow? :) This looks wicked!
I don’t know how you do it Celia. That plum sauce looks soooo tasty. You will have to slap a label on those jars and head to the market I reckon!
Those jars of plum sauce look so appealing. There’s something very comforting I find to a cupboard well stocked with jars of preserves.
Jo, I’ve been tempted to buy some roast duck to have it with! And this morning I’ve been thinking about making spring rolls…
Gillian, Pete makes the jams and sauces, I just take the pictures! :)
Choclette, I couldn’t agree with you more. When I look in the pantry, I get a warm fuzzy feeling. It’s great to have food and gifts ready to go at a moment’s notice, but there’s also something incredibly rewarding about seeing the fruits of our labour. I wrote something about this very early on here.
Sounds delish. Thanks for the recipe. I might have to try my hand at making a jar of this…..and I think I would add in some star anise. For some reason looking at your plum sauce makes me think star anise…or is it just the reference to roast duck?!
Looks lovely! What do you think it would work well with, other than roast duck?
Wow, that’s quite a bounty of sauce. How does it compare to the bought plum sauce Celia? :)
SG, you are the spice queen – I bow to your superior knowledge. If you think it should have star anise, then next time we’ll add a little..
Kavey, it was great on sausages and it’s the traditional accompaniment to spring rolls as well!
Lorraine, it’s a bit less sweet than the commercial stuff – possibly because the plums were quite sour and we didn’t increase the sugar by all that much to compensate. At the moment it’s still a little disjointed, I’m waiting to see what it’s like in a few weeks’ time. Having said that, it didn’t stop me from spooning it all over sausages last night.. :)
wow, that is amazing!! i would never think to add apple, nor ginger, but the rest sounds familiar. maybe a bit of chinese five spice? mmmm, i want duck!
Yet another entry that I looked at and said, “Ooooh, just *wait* until I get back into a real kitchen!” Out of curiosity, how long will it take you to consume six jars of plum sauce? Does it spur you to make meals that will complement it? Or do you share it with your deserving friends?
Dana, this is our first attempt at plum sauce, so I’m not sure how authentically Chinese it is. I’ve invited my mum around for dinner though, so I have no doubt she’ll tell me.. ;-)
Nancy, funny you should ask, I went out and bought a roast duck today as well as ingredients to make spring rolls! We always give away at least half of the preserves we make, but it will still take us a while to get through it!
Ahh ok good to know! Although I think less sweet might not necessarily be a bad thing for those that don’t like it so sweet. Keep us posted on how it develops :)
IT looks so lovely…….I love plum sauce with duck and veggies……..hmmmmmmm
Hi Celia.
I had a glut of plums a couple of months ago, and made a plum sauce.
I feel it would have passed the restaurant “crispy duck” test if I’d had some ginger in it, which I didn’t in.
Yours looks superbly dark and rich. Nice one.
Gill.
Thanks Gill! We actually tried it on pancakes with duck, and it was delicious. Although next time I think we might try adding some star anise…
Not sure how I missed this recipe when it was first published, Celia.
There is usually a glut of Damsons in the Autumn: Damson Jam & Damson Chutney are great ideas but the fruit is very sour and quite difficult to use in desserts.
I think they could be ideal for this recipe – what do you think? I have a daughter who loves Duck in Plum sauce, Chinese style who would be extremely grateful if I cracked this one!
hopeeternal
‘Meanderings through my Cookbook’
http://www.hopeeternalcookbook.wordpress.com
Hope, we’re still eating our way through this, and it just keeps getting better in the jar! :)
I haven’t tried Damsons – we don’t get them here – but the plums we used were quite sour. I do think they might work – you might just need to taste it as you go to see if you need to add more sugar. It is a very nice Chinese style plum sauce, perhaps a little less sweet though than the bottled stuff. It really does need a few weeks in the jar to come together. Hope it works for you! :)
Thank you, Celia. We are just off on holiday but will be visiting our ‘special place’ for Damsons on our return! They really are very sour (and I mean very!) I usually think of Presidents as quite sweet, at least the ones we get here are. I eat them raw and without sugar.
Think I will make a small quantity and check as I go with the sweetness as you suggest. … and I will eventually report back here too.
Thanks
h/e