Victoria Plums - a prelapsarian fruit and reminder of Eden?

Victoria plums are back in the shops. As a boy I helped pick several varieties of plums in the orchards which ran the length of upper Clydeside in Lanarkshire - and you were allowed to eat as you picked. The sensible psychology was that a picker would soon have had enough. A theory which worked even for me - there are only so many plums even greedy connoisseurs can eat and enjoy. But I haven't yet encountered a fruit I enjoy more.

Those orchards are long gone - either garden centres, road upgrading or housing developments have removed all but a couple which are now neglected. The season is late August to mid September so it isn't long to enjoy your favourite fruit. And maybe the sheer enjoyment of them is because they are only available once a year, and not for long. The imported other kinds of plum don't come near British Victorias. You can find out why over here.

William Carlos Williams has this delightful poem about eating cold plums from the fridge, and about the temptation to eat them before anyone else does:

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

Comments

[Catriona]

Wow, that takes me back. We had a Victoria plum tree in our garden and every year I recall being glutted with these lovely, sweet, juicy fruit. And every year my Dad trotted out the same awful joke about the requirement to ship a portion of the crop to the Queen because the nation anthem says (sorry about this) 'send her Victorias'.

Enjoy munching your Victoria plums.

[liz Elliot]

Some tastes take you straight back to childhood - Have you read Nigel Slater's "Toast"? With me it's Victoria plums warm from the tree, sweet cherries with bird pecks out of them and raw rhubarb with the end dipped in granulated sugar! I think with my own kids it'll be wild strawberries and sloe berries -none of them can stomach rhubarb! All the best, Liz