Plum Crazy

Now that I'm retired and walking for exercise around our funky 'hood each morning, I actually stop and chat with my neighbors, rather than the hasty wave they got when I was hurrying on my way to the BART station. You'd have to be crazy to dress for walking as I do, given my age and body type, but I do it anyway - I've reached the age where I figure "What the heck." Plus, not only has it improved community relations, it has been a windfall of fruit.

Several of the nearby yards have fruit trees and some of the kind people who live in those houses have given me their extras. Maybe, given my goofy appearance, they're afraid not to? In any case, an example - yellow plums, so sweet and ripe that they splat if they fall from the tree before you gently pick them. My neighbor up the hill gave me six of these little beauties and the idea for making a fruit picker from a bamboo pole and a soda pop bottle which I'm going to try out today.

I combined those six plums with some of the last strawberries of our local season into two small croustades so sweet and yet tangy that they did a little song and dance on the tongue. All I did was halve the plums and strawberries and arrange them on a crust*, sprinkle them with a little allspice and wrap the crust partway around the fruit before painting it with a egg white and sprinkling with just a touch of sugar. Popped them into a 400 degree oven for about 30-35 minutes and out came these crazy good little tarts, one for me and My Beloved and one for my neighbor to say "Thanks a bunch!"

We're nuts about our neighbors.

*If you want the crust recipe, look here: http://zoomiestation.blogspot.com/2007/08/cookiecrumb-jyah-pear-croustade.html