It is that time of the year when everything seems to be ripening at once. I have a nectarine tree but no other stone fruit, however, there are plums aplenty around town and I have received some from 3 different sources in the last week so today I made jam using 3.4kg of plums.

This is the result.

These were the first batch of plums I was given. They don’t look much but have a lovely flavour and beautiful deep red flesh.

Since having an airfryer I have discovered that it is a relatively quick and easy way to sterilise the jars and lids rather than having to turn the oven on. That is definitely a consideration on a day like today when the forecast temperature was 37C (98.6F).

However, it was not all plain sailing as I had a calamity with the second batch of jars. Thankfully there were only 4 of them but they came to grief when I managed to catch the handle of airfryer with my oven mitt and send the contents flying across the kitchen floor. One jar broke but that was all. GMan kindly swept up the broken glass while I retrieved the remainder and the lids, re-washed them and started the process again.

The other job was somewhat simpler than jam-making as I had some gifted oranges to juice. It is the first time I have had fresh orange juice since we moved here which has been a bit of a shock after having what seemed like an endless supply from the 3 trees we had in our previous garden.

Finally, we were delighted to record 42mm of rain in a series of thunderstorms overnight. It has given the garden a welcome soaking during what has been several weeks of fairly hot, dry weather.