I’ve complained this season about my peaches- but dry weather is helping and they are finally getting above 12% sugar. What I haven’t complained much about is this year’s plum crop where I’ve been sampling many varieties I’ve never tried before and have found many to be over-the-top delicious.
Today’s gift was a few Larodas from a graft. I wasn’t expecting anything much beyond being like Santa Rosa but it is better to my palate- as good as any plum I grow. Solid purple on the outside- one plum was quite large but all were just as sweet with just the right touch of tartness along with a nice meatyness. What was most amazing of all was the beauty of the flesh which runs from deep red to golden amber. They are sweeter than any Santa Rosa I’ve harvested here and the flesh is more beautiful than any plum I’ve ever seen.
Now I only have to find out how consistent a cropper it is here and if it works out I will have 3 amazing Santa Rosa types that bear from early to late season.
I also harvested about 30 pounds of Green Gage plums today and got a 24 brix reading on one I randomly picked. They are sweet and good but not as WOW as the two Laredos is ate today.
Plums are visually the most diversely beautiful fruit I grow. Too bad my phone sucks at transferring photos to the internet. Maybe my son can help me with that today.
Where did the name Laroda come from.[quote=“Drew51, post:3, topic:12449”]
I have Laroda I grafted this year. Is that what you mean?
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Yeah, you’re right. I spent my earliest boyhood in Scottsdale Ariz and that cowboy song about walking the streets of Laredo is indelibly embedded in my brain. Pretty spooky song.
I have a large crop of Dapple Dandy too. I didn’t thin well, they still sized up, and the tree didn’t move either. A very unique taste, but I don’t really care for them. I will be replacing them with something else.
So far for me Nadia was the best plum. Not many to compare too though. I thought it was better than Satsuma by a mile.I have a weeping Santa Rosa, but it will not produce till maybe next year. Still forming the weeping structure.
I agree Laroda is very similar to but a notch up from Santa Rosa. I wish it would set better for me. It was not in the best sun so I moved it. My new graft should bloom next spring.
I recently tilted my brix-meter with some French Prunes I let sit on the counter for a week… I could just see a little blue off the scale, it was around 34 or so. That was definitely some plum heaven!
I’ve seen E plums some seasons where they gradually turned into prunes on the tree. Didn’t have the refractometer then but as the water exits the sugar remains so they just kept getting sweeter, maybe more was being put into the fruit from the leaves also.
So you liked them better with less water?
Apples convert starch to sugar as they store- does stonefruit do this?
Plums used to be dried that way in CA, I’m sure some home growers must still do it.
I think they are best a bit earlier as the flavor “rounds out” as they sit and is less intense. Maybe 30 brix was on average the best. Still pretty high
The standard line is they don’t increase by much, but I have been seeing a fairly big increase this year. Maybe the fruit is so full of water at harvest this year, and they are then losing some of that quickly. The ones that were 34+ brix were wrinked and clearly dried out, but even after a few days they would be sweeter in spite of looking the same. I put some peaches in the fridge this year and I am sure they sweetened up - my Athenas went from numbers well below 15 to around 18. The fridge can also desiccate.
How would you compare the eating experience of the partially dehydrated peaches to how they were off the tree? Stonefruit that goes into my fridge usually is given away or frozen and I seldom eat it raw out of the fridge. My greatest fruit growing joy is taking sun warmed fruit ripe off the tree and eating it. Because I started this game here over 25 years ago there is usually something ripe to pick from the time first fruit ripens until the last drops.
I gather the partially room dried plums are more enjoyable to eat as they dehydrate and also maybe convert some starch to sugar.
Have to remember to ask you for some wood of French Prune.
