Plums perfect

Red plums are perfect just now, nicely priced and flavorful. What are some of your favorite ways to have them? We enjoyed grilled quartered plums as a side dish for sauteed shrimp this evening, with orange poppyseed rice as the other side.

Cool, fresh and raw. Perfect.

Or a nice vodka punsch.

The only way I've ever used plums, other than eating them raw, is to substitute them for cherries in Julia Child's recipe for a clafoutis.

Edited by NorthAmerican to add the link.

As it is lol

I love ripe plums. I cut them into halves, stoned them and eat them straightaway :) I prefer the soft to the hard types.

This Is Just to Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast.

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.

--William Carlos Williams, plum thief

I've also only eaten plums raw. I hate when they look juicy and ripe but taste sour, so I don't buy them that often. Grilled plums sounds like it would go good with pork.

Do you do something to prepare them or just throw them on the grill? About how long do they take?

Edited by: sashac001 for instructions.

The Joy of Cooking has a cake called APPLE, PEACH, OR PLUM CAKE COCKAIGNE I haven't made it with plums, but i have made it with peaches and it's very good. It's more like a coffee cake than a dessert cake.

(Mrs. Rombauer's daughter, who took over the book when Mrs. R. died, used "Cockaigne," the name of her family home, to designated her favorite recipes.)

#7 -- That is better with the purple Italian prune plums, in my opinion. And (also in my opinion) it's better with just a shortcake dough (slightly sweetened biscuit dough with an egg in it).

I admit to bias on the grounds that my way is the way my mother always made plum kuchen.

#6 - Cut plums in half or quarters, remove pits. I used the broiler feature of my toaster-oven, spread the quartered plums on a pan I'd sprayed with vegetable oil, with the skin-side towards the heat. Cooked about 6 minutes. Original recipe was for an outdoor grill and called for cooking them 4 minutes per side. If/when I try that I'll put them in the mesh grill basket I use when cooking vegetables or whole mushrooms.

Another recipe suggested using the grilled plums to top a salad (greens, goat cheese, toasted walnuts, red onion, fruity viniagrette dressing)
http://heavytable.com/grilled-plum-salad-a-la-mill-valley-kitchen/

A recipe for Plum Cake for the heterosexual men of the GS branch:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic93AKpR_pQ

You're welcome!

Thanks Midwestener! If I get a chance to make it I'll put it in my grilling basket and serve it with pork. My husband made a face when I suggested it but I know that's just cause I haven't made it for him yet.

croissantaubeurre: I'd bet that men watching the video on how to make a plum cake were too distracted by the melons to pay attention to the recipe.

sashac001: I think that the usual pairing is prunes and pork, but plums and pork sounds pretty good to me.

hohoho those are luscious-looking melons ... ermmmm I mean plums! ;)