The plum tale is interesting.
Sans refrigeration, they had to scramble to preserve food for the fall/winter larder.
My grandmother used to “put up” summer’s bounty....tomatoes, peaches, and the like.
That musta been hard work.....boiling all those jars, filling them up, and sterilizing everything.
Yes, “putting up” was a ton of work. We are so spoiled today.
My mother tells a story of her great grandmother in Louisiana when the union troops came storming into their home demanding food. She showed them the larder with all the jars of peaches and told the soldiers that she had put rat poison into one of the jars. They left her larder be.