As many of you know, I grow food for my family on less than 1/10th of an acre in Los Angeles. But I also manage my family’s 1892 farmstead orchard of over 60 fruit trees. This means I do a lot of canning this time of year!
Right now, it is plum season on the farm and I have buckets and buckets of fruit to put up and split among all my family members.
As you probably guessed, I do a lot of plum jam. But another one of my favorite methods for using up an abundance of fruit is to make plum syrup.
Making Plum Syrup:
The finished product can be used in dessert recipes, cocktails or even as an ice tea sweetener.
In order to tackle the large number of plums I have, I make syrup as a two-step, overnight process. This makes it less stressful because I just do a little bit one afternoon, let it sit overnight and then finish it up in the morning. But you could certainly do this all in one afternoon if the mood struck you.
Make Large or Small Batches:
You will notice there are only a few specific measurements in the recipe below. This is because you can make this recipe with any amount of plums – large or small.
And keep in mind that the process is not an exact science and you will get varying levels of syrup thickness based on the pectin level of your fruit. So, don’t sweat it. The most important part is the FLAVOR. The thickness does not matter.
If you wish the syrup to be thicker, simply cook it longer (evaporating more of the water content). But watch it carefully so that it does not burn.
Spiced Plum Syrup Recipe
This recipe is versatile. You can make it with just a quart of plums or a bucket of plums. Once you have followed the steps below to get the juice, you measure and add equal amounts of sugar. Easy!
As you would expect, the yield of this recipe depends upon how many plums you start with. But as a rule of thumb, you should get about two 1/2-pint jars from every cup of plum juice in step 9. You will need cheesecloth, jelly strainer or a thin cotton tea towel for straining in this recipe.
Ingredients
- Fresh plums
- Small amount of water
- Sugar
- Fresh squeezed lemon juice
- Ground Cinnamon
Day One:
1) Wash and pit your fresh plums. Leave on the skins for color and flavor. There is no need to chop or cut up the flesh. Just quickly remove the pits and move on. (Keep it simple!)
2) To a large, heavy bottomed stockpot, add enough water to just cover the bottom 1/4 of an inch deep. This is to prevent burning while the plums begin to release their juice.
3) Fill the pot with the plums. Do not fill the pot more than 3/4 full.
4) Turn the heat to medium-low and cover the pot for 10 minutes.
5) Stir the plums a bit to be sure it is not burning. Adjust your heat if necessary so that they do not burn but are coming up in temperature.
6) Keep the plums covered, stirring every 10 minutes until they begin to simmer. Then remove the lid and bring to a full boil, stirring occasionally. This entire cooking process can take anywhere from 20-40 minutes depending upon how many plums you are cooking.
7) After the plums have boiled for several minutes, you will notice they start to breakdown and become mushy. That is what you want. All the juices are being released at this point. Once the mixture is very broken down, turn off the heat and let the mixture cool for at least 30 minutes before moving on to the next step. This is so you do not burn yourself while pouring.
8) Place a colander over a new stockpot and line it with cheesecloth or a thin tea towel. Carefully pour the plum mixture through this cloth. (You can also use a jelly strainer for this step if you wish.) No matter how you are straining the juice, your filter will quickly fill up and need to sit for an hour or overnight to completely drain. I prefer to let it sit overnight. You would be surprised how much juice you get when it sits for hours. Just cover the entire thing with another cloth to keep out dust, etc.
Day Two:
At this point, you will be finishing up and processing the syrup. Be sure to have clean canning jars, new lids (sitting in warm water) and your water bath canner filled up and heating on the stove.
9) In the morning, you will have several cups of plum juice. If you want crystal clear syrup, you can strain again. But I don’t find that is necessary. A few bits of fruit will only add flavor. At this point, measure how many cups of juice you have and pour it into a clean, heavy bottomed stockpot.
10) For every cup of plum juice add: one cup of granulated sugar and 1 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice. I also like to add a little cinnamon to my syrup but it is optional. (For every 2 cups of juice, I would add 1/4 tsp. of ground cinnamon.) If you wish to add more, wait until you have heated and dissolved the sugar. Taste and adjust the cinnamon if you wish.
11) Heat the mixture to boiling, stirring almost constantly. Turn off heat and ladle into your canning jars.
12) Wipe the rims, add your lids and rings. Process in a water bath canner for 10 minutes.
13) After the jars are processed and cooled, check the seals. Store unsealed jars in the refrigerator. Store sealed jars for up to 1 year on the pantry shelf.
About Theresa Loe
Theresa Loe is an award-winning garden writer for television, print media and video. She is also one of the founding producers of Growing A Greener World, bringing her voice and expertise both on-camera and behind-camera from day one. She is passionate about taking the garden full circle (from seed, to pantry, to table) and shares how to capture seasonal, fresh-picked flavor.
We have a very large harvest of plumbs this year. we got the ideas to make your syrup for gifts this coming Christmas season. Therefore we found a nice glass syrup bottle and a lid (lug lid). According to the seller we can go through the process of a hot water bath, with these products and all will work fine. They also sell a bottle and lid for a hot fill method.
The lid has what they call Plasitsol Liner (vinyl) that makes the seal.
Do you have any experience with this product? Do you have any advise with this approach?
Hi Thayne,
I’m sorry – I don’t have any experience with that type of bottle. I’m not sure. 🙁
Our ten year old dwarf yellow plum finally produced and it is a bumper crop! After canning several jars of near honey like syrup I was left with an ample amount of plum pulp – I came up with an incredible mincemeat pie recipe which competes with the syrup – and I used my slow cooker to make it! To each cup of pulp I added 1/4 cup brown sugar, to this I followed a simple recipe for non – meat mincemeat – I like those used for mincemeat made w/green tomatoes only I’m using plum pulp instead. It is important to add 1 tbs of lemon juice like the plum syrup recipe calls for to replace the acid needed and it helps with thickening as well – I also used apples,pears and raisins in this recipe and don’t forget salt! Good mincemeat is a fall crop recipe so be creative. I canned my quart jars for 20 minutes at 15 pounds and this is incredible in pies – I add butter later as a seasoning when I make my pies to avoid having to increase the canning time needed – I add 1/8 tsp of each seasoning or 1 tsp pumpkin/apple pie season for each pie to make sure that wonderful seasoning is still strong. By doing this I actually doubled my plum canning!
Charline – That is absolutely brilliant. And sounds divine!! {High five!}
I’m making homemade plum sodas for the fall, and I’ve made your syrup using fresh plums from out in the country. Do you think I should mix the syrup with a different juice (like white grape juice) and cut down the sugar or should I just use filtered water and keep the sugar mixture as is?
Hi Mark,
I think either would be fine. I suppose it just depends upon the amount of sugar you want and the flavor you are looking for. But I think either way would work.
You specify a new stockpot in step 8. Why is that?
Because my first stockpot is full of boiling hot plums and I am pouring that mixture into a second pot (with a colander on top to catch the pulp).
Is it absolutely necessary to pit the plums? My plums are fairly small, and they are very difficult to pit. Could I just cut them in half and leave the pit in one side? I seriously wish the previous owner of my home had planted a freestone variety of plum! They are a pain, but so delicious.
You do NOT need to pit the plums. Do it just as you describe and it will be fine. You are straining out the pulp anyway so the pits will strained out as well. Enjoy!
I always add an extra step to your process: Drop the plums into boiling water for a minute: let them cool and now it will be very easy to remove pits.
And I omit the last step, water bath even though master preservers suggest it for extra degree of safety. But with the high sugar content, the syrup will be perfectly safe. Microorganisms cannot grow with such high sugar.
Could I use a steam juicer instead of boiling the plums to get the juice?
Absolutely Shelley – A steam juicer would be the best way to go. I just didn’t give those instructions because most people don’t have them. I love mine and use it all the time. Much easier!
What do you do with the fruit left in the strainer? I would use it to make plum butter. My mother
Never threw anything away. She would even make pear butter of the core and skins she peeled while canning pears. Just wondering.
Hi Dorothy,
I let it cool and feed it to my chickens. But I like your idea much better! I will try making plum butter with my next batch. What a fabulous idea. Thanks!
I have never canned before so if I ask stupid questions you’ll know why. You state the fruit releases pectin, do I need to add additional pectin? What do I add to make it spiced plum sauce or does it make it? If I make it like it says will it be spicy (I do not like spicy)?
Hi Sharon,
There are not stupid questions!
1) For this recipe, you do not need to add pectin. This is because we are making a syrup and not jelly or jam. The pectin is what would react with the acid and sugar in the mix and create the “gel”. All fruit has some pectin (some more than others) and we don’t need this to be thick to be delicious.
2) It is “spiced” (because of the cinnamon or other spices you could add). But it is not “spicy” like hot sauce. There is no heat. If you don’t want to add the cinnamon, it is okay to leave it out or you can add different spices. But I would not recommend adding heat (hot peppers) as I do not know how that would taste.
I hope that helps!
Theresa do you think this would be good using peaches?
Absolutely Gayle. You can do it with any fruit. 🙂