Plum lekvar that holds its dome in a kolache at 375°F.
Prune plums, skins on, about nine hours in a wide pan until a spoon stands up in it. This is the plum lekvar for kolaches that Central Texas bakers keep asking for and the one you want on toast. Made in Austin, sold by inquiry, picked up or delivered locally.
Plum lekvar takes about nine hours. Most of that is waiting and scraping the bottom of the pan.
Three ingredients and a long afternoon.
Italian prune plums, cane sugar and a squeeze of lemon. That is the list. The plums come in crates in late summer, get halved and pitted by hand the same day, and go into wide shallow pans with the skins still on. Skins are where the colour and most of the pectin live. Peeled plums give you a pale, loose jam that no amount of boiling will fix.
One part sugar to four parts fruit, by weight. You will taste the plum first. Supermarket plum filling is usually closer to one to one, often with cornstarch or modified starch to fake the body, which is why it tastes of sugar and sets like pudding.
From there it is reduction. Nine hours on low gas, scraped across the bottom every few minutes near the end so the sugars on the pan floor do not catch and turn bitter. The batch loses more than half its weight in water. What is left is dark, almost black in the jar, and sticks to the spoon when you turn it over.
No pectin, no starch, no colour
Nothing from a box goes in. Not pectin, not starch, not citric acid beyond the lemon, no colouring. A pound of pitted plums becomes under 7 oz of lekvar, which is the honest reason a jar costs $11 and not $4.
- Fruit
- Italian prune plums, halved and pitted by hand, skins left on
- Sugar : fruit
- About 1:4 by weight. 1:6 reduced-sugar batch on request, +$1 per 8 oz
- Cook
- About 9 hours in wide pans on low gas
- Set
- A spoon stands in it. Holds a ridge when drawn across
- Bake
- Tested at 375°F in a kolache before jarring
- Added pectin
- None
- Sizes
- 8 oz jar, 16 oz jar, 2 lb tub, 5 lb pail
- Handover
- Pickup in Austin, or local delivery $8 flat per order
Kolaches, hamantaschen, toast, and a spoon in yogurt.
Fill rates below are what we get in our own oven with a standard dough. Yours may differ by a few units either way depending on how deep you press the well.
Kolache filling
About half an ounce per kolache, pressed into the well cold. A 2 lb tub fills roughly 60 kolaches. We have counted. The dome stays where you put it and the streusel does not sink into it.
Hamantaschen
A teaspoon in the middle, corners folded and pinched hard. Lekvar is the traditional fill and the only one we have found that does not weep out of the seam while the cookie bakes. An 8 oz jar does about 30.
On toast
It spreads cold without tearing bread, which matters more than it sounds. Good on rye and on a buttered English muffin. It does not slide off the slice while you carry it to the table.
Yogurt and cheese
A spoon stirred through plain whole-milk yogurt turns it purple and barely sweetens it. Also good with a hard sheep's milk cheese, though the damson butter is sharper for that.
The test every batch has to pass
Before a batch is jarred, one of us presses a spoonful into a dough round and bakes it at 375°F for 14 minutes. If the filling climbs the rim or thins out into a puddle, the whole batch goes back on the gas. That costs us an hour and it is the only reason we can promise a baker that the tub behaves the same on Tuesday as it did last month.
We will not sell a lekvar batch that failed the bake test as "fine for toast". It goes back in the pan or it does not go out.
Four containers, one price basis.
The 8 oz jar sets the base at $11. Everything larger is a multiple of it, because the glass and the labour per ounce fall as the container grows.
An estimate, not a quote. We confirm the price by phone or email before anything is made. Six units or more takes 8% off, 24 or more 14%, 72 or more 20%. Austin delivery is a flat $8 per order, shown separately from the jars.
What happens after you send the form.
Questions bakers ask first.
Including who this jar is wrong for.
Will it run out of a kolache in the oven?
Not at 375°F. Every batch is baked into a test kolache before it is jarred, and if the filling climbs the rim the batch goes back in the pan. Above 400°F in a deck oven with a long bake we would ask you to test a tub first, because that is a harder ask than our own oven.
How long does an unopened jar keep?
Sealed and in a cupboard away from light, a year is reasonable. Opened, keep it in the fridge and use it within about four weeks. The freshness guarantee covers a jar that reaches you with a broken seal.
Can I get it less sweet?
Yes, a 1:6 batch, $1 more per 8 oz equivalent because it has to cook longer to reach the same set. It tastes sharper and the colour goes a shade lighter. Say so in the inquiry and we cook it with the next plum run.
Who should not buy this?
Anyone who wants a loose, pourable plum jam for pancakes, and anyone outside Texas who needs it shipped. We do not ship across state lines. We also do not do private-label jars with your bakery's name on them.
Is it the same as prune plum butter?
Close. Prune plum butter and lekvar are the same idea, fruit cooked down with little sugar until it is a paste. Lekvar is the Central European name and it is usually cooked further, which is what makes it bake-stable. Our damson plum butter is a different fruit and much more tart.
Send an inquiry. One of us answers it.
Tell us the size, the count and when you need it. We reply with the confirmed price and a pickup or delivery time.
68 Oak Lane, Office 12Austin, Texas 86853