Agen Prunes

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Agen Prunes are prunes made in Agen, France. They are dark purple with a hint of blue in them.

They are the dried version of plums called "Ente" plums grown in the Lot-et-Garonne region.

The Ente plum is a hybrid of a damask plum. The Ente tree is reproduced by grafting. It can grow 13 to 16 feet (4 to 5 metres) and will live about 60 years, and start bearing fruit after 7 years. You get about 220 pounds (100kg) of plums from each tree each year.

The plums have very thin, purplish-red skin.

The harvest happens between the third week of August and the third week of September. It is done using machines that shake the machines and that have collars that go around the trunks of the trees to catch the falling plums. The plums are then washed and sorted. They used to be first dried in the sun, then in ovens, but now this has all been replaced by drying tunnels, in which the plums spend about 20 hours at 167 F (75 C) on racks. One tunnel can dry 11 tons of prunes a day. Larger producers have their own drying tunnels; smaller producers bring the plums to cooperatively owned drying tunnels.

The goal is to reduce the fruit to having a moisture level at the end of 21 to 23%. It takes 6.6 to 7.7 pounds (3 to 3 1/2 kg) of plums to make 2.2 pounds (1 kg) of the prunes.

After drying, they are classed into three sizes: small, medium and large (called le fretin, la rame et la grosse.)

Regulations now determine what can be called an Agen Prune. It must be of a certain minimum size, it must have come from an Ente tree, and it must have been dried properly.

The main competitor is California prunes.


History
Some people say the Ente plum was in France since the Romans; others say it was brought there from Syria by the returning crusaders.

The monks are Clairac Abbey were the first to grow it.

Production was at first in the Quercy and Rouergue regions, and remained there from the 1400s till the end of the 1600s.

The prunes been exported since at least the 1600s.

In 1709, a very severe winter wiped out the trees in the Quercy and Rouergue regions. The orchards were restarted in the Agen area where it was milder, and Agen took over as the production centre.

They were at first called Bordeaux Prunes, because that is the port they were shipped through.

Television commercials to promote the prunes started in 1965.

Agen Prunes received European PDO status in 2002.

Language Notes
"Ente" comes from the an old French word "enter" (pronounced "ahn - tay") meaning "to graft."

Also called:
Pruneaux d'Agen (French) Top...