Plums Quotes

“When you paint Spring, do not paint willows, plums, peaches, or apricots, but just paint Spring. To paint willows, plums, peaches, or apricots is to paint willows, plums, peaches, or apricots - it is not yet painting Spring.”
― Eihei Dogen

“Plums deify.”
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

“Dinner that night is a feast of flavor. To celebrate the successful exorcism, Kagura has cooked several more dishes than the shrine's usual, simple fare- fragrant onigiri, balls of rice soaked in green tea, with umeboshi- salty and pickled plums- as filling. There is eggplant simmered in clear soup, green beans in sesame sause, and burdock in sweet-and-sour dressing. The mood is festive.”
― Rin Chupeco, The Girl from the Well

“She read about dreams made of sunlight and plums, and dreams made of ice; dreams that glowed in the dark, dreams made of unwound fingerprints, dreams that flew away like a lost kite string.”
― Michelle Cuevas, The Dreamatics

“This white broth...
... is soy milk!"
"That's right! I mixed a dash of parmesan cheese and a little dollop of miso paste into the soy milk and then lightly simmered it.
This is my pike dish...
Pike Takikomi Rice, Ojiya Style!"
OJIYA
Also called "Zosui," Ojiya is soup stock and seasonings added to precooked rice, vegetables and fish and cooked into a thick porridge. It is distinctly different from dishes like risotto, which is uncooked rice that is first sautéed in butter and oils before adding liquid... and Okayu, which is a rice gruel cooked to soupy softness in extra water.
"Soy milk?"
"Ah, so you finally see it, Alice.
Like all soups, the most important part of Ojiya porridge is the stock!
He built this dish to be porridge from the start...
... with soy milk as the "stock"!"
"Soy milk as soup stock?!"
"Can you even do that?!"
"So that's what it is!
Soup stock is essentially meant to be pure umami. Like kombu kelp- a common stock- soy milk is packed with the umami component glutamic acid. It's more than good enough to serve as a sound base for the Ojiya porridge! Not only that, umami flavors synergies with each other. Adding two umami components to the same dish will magnify the flavor exponentially!
The inosinic acid in the pike and the glutamic acid in the soy milk... combining the two makes perfect, logical sense! "
"Soy milk Ojiya Porridge. Hm. How interesting!"
" Mm! Delicious! The full-bodied richness of the cheese and the mild, salty flavor of the miso meld brilliantly with the rice! Then there are the chunks of tender pike meat mixed in...
... with these red things. Are they what I think they are?"
"Yep! They're crunchy pickled-plum bits!"
"What?!"
"Again with the dirt cheap, grocery store junk food! Like that cracker breading and the seaweed jelly pearls..."
"He totally dumped those in there just for the heck of it!"
"These pickled plums are a very important facet of the overall dish! They have a bright, pleasing color and a fun, crunchy texture. Not only that, their tart flavor cuts through the rich oiliness of the pike meat, giving the dish a fresh, clean aftertaste. And, like all vinegary foods, they stir the appetite- a side effect that this dish takes full advantage of!
Finally, these plums are salt pickled! It is no wonder they make a perfect accent to the pickled pike at the center of the dish!"”
― Yuto Tsukuda, 食戟のソーマ 13 [Shokugeki no Souma 13]

“She loved rhubarb pie. She loved the morning sun. She loved drying the sheets on the clothesline, even in the dead of winter. She loved a good pot of jasmine tea. She loved orange rinds and gossip and peacock feathers. She loved plums."
"Plums. Greengage plums?"
"Yes, greengage plums.”
― Melanie Gideon, Valley of the Moon

“Mmm! It's so hot and juicy! It looks like he marinated the eel in some red wine and cinnamon to underscore its flavor with a touch of freshness before he cooked it."
"I stuck some gunpowder in that eel, y'know. Some very special gunpowder...
to blow your dish out of the water!"
"Mmm! What?!"
Where did this sharp, vivid taste come from?!
The eel.
Kurokiba must have secreted something inside of it...
He got us.
It's dried plums!"
Dried plums? You mean prunes?!"
"Eel and prunes?!"
Aha.
He rehydrated some dried plums and then used the crépine to keep them wrapped inside of the eel.
"Mmm! The fruity tang of the plums is mixing together with the rich, heavy juices from the eel...”
― Yuto Tsukuda, 食戟のソーマ 11 [Shokugeki no Souma 11]

“Umeshu, often translated as "plum wine," is spirit made from steeping ume plums in shochu with sugar.”
― Tetsu Kariya, Vegetables

“Unlike me, my mother loves plums. This, coupled with some leftover red wine, leads to a fruitful development. I roasted the plums in a medium oven with the wine, added a split vanilla bean, a cinnamon stick, and the tiniest bit of sugar. The plums gave way, exchanging the springiness for a comforting sag. The wine bubbled into a spiced burgundy syrup, thick and glossy. I served it with faiselle, a mild spoonable cheese, though I sense that sour cream, Greek yogurt, or mascarpone wouldn't go amiss.”
― Elizabeth Bard, Picnic in Provence: A Memoir with Recipes

“The fruits scorch in the fierce heat. The smell of plum jam fills the kitchen. Flesh bubbles, edges blacken, plum juices burst from their skins and mingle with the honey and lemon. Twenty minutes later they emerge, collapsed in a pool of deepest purple-red. I twist the lid from a bottle of rosewater, hand-made, no label, and shake drops over the scorched fruit. A scent of rose, sweet fruit and honey. We let the fruit rest for ten minutes.
The roasted plums are served on an old tin dish, a mound of salted labneh at their side, the juices seeping into the soft, thick yoghurt like lipstick into a pantomime dame's pancake make-up. I rain a pinch of dried rose petals over the surface and offer them up. We spoon the soft fruit and labneh into our mouths, then lift the dishes to our lips to drink the last drop of rose-perfumed juice.”
― Nigel Slater, A Thousand Feasts: Small Moments of Joy… A Memoir of Sorts