The quote above is by Marwood Yeatman from his excellent book The Last Food of England. August is the time that plums start ripening and when tasting the first of this year, a wonderfully sweet, yellow-fleshed hedge plum, I considered that his quote applied to me – I had no idea of what our local plum might be called. I knew the generic name for these hedge plums was a myrobalan, or cherry plum, but were they a local speciality? It turns out that Somerset doesn’t have a local plum, or not a specifically named one anyway, although I know where to find plenty within the hedgerows and the characteristics of each.
Sloes
Our use of plums in hedging is a peculiarity of the English countryside, and dates back at least as far as the 1700s. Of course, the prunus genus has existed in the wild for far longer. Prunus spinosa or Sloe, is native shrub with vicious thorns and whose dark black fruits are so sour that they are inedible raw. Nowadays we steep the fruit in gin with added sugar to counteract their astringency. But our early ancestors would have realised the value of those thorns, and the dense thicket they create.
The Romans taught us cultivation skills such as grafting, although after they left this was practised only by the wealthy, in monasteries or manor houses. The fruit that most people ate still came from the wild. Hedges of plums were probably first planted to provide a wind break around the cultivated orchards, but the dense hedging proved popular in other farming settings.
Bullace and Damsons
In addition to Prunus spinosa, and perhaps a mutation of it, is the Bullace (or Bolas as it was first recorded). Bullace look superficially similar, and are often found in the same places as sloes; but the fruits are bigger and may be black or green in colour. The gangly trees on which they grow do not have the poisonous spikes found on blackthorn and the flesh is less astringent.
Whether native or a mutation, Bullace is now classified as a sub-species (Prunus insititia) but the name seems to mean different things to different people and certainly in different parts of the country. There are several variants and the area of most disagreement is around which of these are classed as Damsons. My understanding was that a damson is just a cultivated form of bullace, or to put it the other way around, a bullace is a wild damson. However, other attributes that come into the debate are the shape (round or oval) and intensity of flavour . Here are some quotes from Dorothy Hartley’s Food in England on the subject:
“ the small hard damsons from the grey twisted trees in old gardens are best. The new rounded damsons, and “plum damsons” may be larger fruit, but they are not so firm and spicy as the old fashioned, small, oval damson with bloomy skin and green flesh”.
“ Bolas or (modern) bullaces, are as old as damsons; they are rounder in shape and have not the same rich syrup as real damsons. For damson cheese, or damson wine, or bottled damsons, it is very essential to be sure you get the long-shaped, narrow-stoned damsons.”
Dorothy Hartley was writing in 1954, and her observations are based around the flavour differences between modern cultivated damson and the older types rather than the historic origin of damsons, which is uncertain. Near where I live in Somerset you can find growing together: sloes, bullace (small, round and sour enough to need cooking), and larger bullace that you could eat raw (although probably not too many). We also have the old-type small oval damsons growing at the edge of our orchard.
Enthusiasm for damsons seems also to be particularly English. The Lythe Valley in Cumbria is famous for them, but there are also the Shropshire Prune (actually a damson) and a Godshill Damson as named varieties. They are also the preferred hedging in Shropshire and Kent as well as being the only type of plum grown commercially north of Norfolk.
A “local” named plum would have occurred where the growing conditions were particularly favourable for them. Plums usually propagate via suckers, which in itself helps create a hedge structure. Where they grow from the stone, like apples, the resulting plant will bear fruit that is different from the parent, although it is believed that some damsons do run true. There are relatively few cultivars of damson compared with plums. When people felt they had a plum (or damson) with special qualities they would take care to replicate those qualities by grafting.
The subspecies Insititia to which damsons and bullace belong, does include some foreign plums, such as the German Kriechenpflaume or French quetsche, for which the word “damson” is sometimes used to refer to them in English. However, when compared with English damsons they lack both the typical intense flavour and the pear-shaped (pyriform) appearance. It was the Scottish nurseryman Robert Hogg who commented that “the Damson seems to be a fruit peculiar to England. We do not meet with it abroad, nor is any mention of it made in any of the pomological works or nurseryman’s catalogues on the Continent“.
Cherry-Plums
The early ripening cherry-plums (Prunus cerasifera) that I referred to at the start of this article originated in western China but became naturalised here. The fruit comes in many colours: yellow, red, and black, and look most like a cherry but with a plum flesh, hence their common name. All are edible, some are good raw, others are best cooked, perhaps as jam, or turned into plum eau-de-vie.
The yellow-fleshed cherry-plum is the one that ripens first and is perhaps the best known because it is sometimes planted as a free-standing tree in gardens as well as being found in hedges. This one is often referred to as a Mirabelle, although the true Mirabelle is believed to have descended from the Caucasus area and was then cultivated in the Lorraine region of France. Botanically it is classified as Prunus domestica subsp. syriaca.
So, whilst they might not be genuine Mirabelle’s, we oughtn’t pass by our yellow myrobalan but instead take inspiration from its famous relative.
What was notable about this year’s first taste of the yellow cherry-plum in the third week of July was how sweet they were. This is not always the case, but they have had plenty of sun this year. It is not even the case for all that I have tasted this year. Some are still not yet ripe in the second week of August and there are considerable differences between those on the sunny side of the hedge and those on the shady side. The beauty of this particular wild plum is that it is always sweet enough to eat raw but can be a bit bland. However, it is good to be able to pick and eat fruit straight from the tree as you walk even if they lack depth to the flavour.
The protected name Mirabelle de Lorraine actually covers two varieties: Mirabelle de Nancy and Mirabelle de Metz, both of which can be purchased from nurseries here, so it is quite possible that those planted in gardens may well be botanically “genuine” Mirabelles. I put genuine in inverted commas because the whole point of protected food names is supposed to be that they are only genuine when produced in the region of origin because that particular terroir brings out the best in them.
Botanical authenticity is therefore not all. Terroir does play its part, so that a named variety purchased from a nursery will not necessarily taste the same as it did in the place that bought it sufficient notice to bother grafting.
80% of the world’s Mirabelles do come from Lorraine under the protected name but they are also grown in the south of France, Spain, USA and Canada. I also find it interesting that two distinct types and areas are covered under one protected name. Here are the characteristics of each variety:
- Mirabelle de Nancy: The benchmark variety from Lorraine; large for a Mirabelle, deep golden-yellow with red speckling, very sweet and aromatic. Ripens in mid-August.
- Mirabelle de Metz: Slightly smaller and rounder than Nancy, with a purer gold colour and a touch more acidity that makes it especially prized for eau-de-vie production.
The lesson, I believe, is to taste the cherry-plums you find and think about how they could best be utilised. Lorraine certainly provides plenty of examples beyond the eau-di-vie and jams, for example they are also cooked in sweet tarts and made into a sauce to accompany pork. The city of Metz holds a festival every August Mirabelle de Metz Plums Information and Facts
The red skinned cherry-plums are usually a week or two behind the yellow ones in ripening and then come the darker black ones. Their skins are often tougher than the yellow ones and they have more astringency which makes them better for cooking (although I have just eaten some sweet ripe black ones today).
Wild Cherries
Finally, although not plums, I should mention that there are wild cherries (Prunus avium) too, most famous of which are the Mazzards of Landkey, North Devon. There are several named variants of these, and they are most often bottled or made into a liqueur.
Summary
Between these main categories there has been plenty of crossbreeding, so it is inevitable that we cannot always accurately identify them. Perhaps we shouldn’t get too hung up on botanical identification – after all none of them are poisonous. Tasting them will help us to work out how they might be best used.
Recipe
What could be more English than a Damson & Gin Sorbet? Damsons are ripening now, so get out and pick some soon.
Damson and Gin Sorbet
This has a very adult flavour, not just because of the gin but also the bitter almond flavour contributed by the damson stones. The colour is fantastic.
There is a considerable difference in the ratio of stone to flesh depending on whether the damsons are wild or cultivated so you will need to taste and adjust the sweetness accordingly.
500g damsons
50 ml water
Approx. 150 g sugar
2 tbsps gin (if you have Damson Gin so much the better)
Put the damsons in a pan with the water and cook until the fruit is completely soft. Push the fruit through a coarse-meshed nylon sieve to remove the skins and stones. Depending on the type of damsons used you will have about 350 ml of purée. Add the sugar in stages, stirring to dissolve and tasting after each addition, until you are happy with the sweetness. Add the gin and chill thoroughly for several hours or overnight before churning in an ice cream maker.
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