Overview
About Damson plum
Damson (Prunus insititia) is the small, blue-black, mouth-drying plum that almost nobody eats raw.
It exists to be cooked into jam and damson cheese, or drowned in sugar and gin. Its trigger story is short and loud: damson sits at the worst grade on our polyol scale, the sorbitol family of FODMAPs, and grades high FODMAP overall with a moderate amount of free fructose. Everything else is quiet. No histamine, no histamine liberation, no oxalate, no sulfites, no nickel and no nightshade involvement, so if damsons cause you trouble, sorbitol is very likely the whole answer.
Sensitivities
How Damson plum scores
Watch for
What trips people up
- Worst grade on the polyol scale. Sorbitol is exactly why stone fruit has a laxative reputation, and damson carries more of it than the everyday plum does
- Moderate excess fructose stacking on top, so the two poorly absorbed sugars arrive together
- Damson jam and damson cheese are the fruit boiled down several times over. Per spoonful the sorbitol is far denser than in the fresh fruit, and the sugar added alongside does not dilute the trigger, it just hides the tartness
- Sloe-style damson gin is not a way around this. The fruit steeps for months and the water-soluble sugars, sorbitol included, move into the liquid you drink. A sweet damson liqueur carries the fruit chemistry with it, plus the alcohol
- Salicylate grades clean here, which is unusual for a dark-skinned tart plum where the common plum grades moderate. If salicylates are your suspected trigger, treat that particular grade as low confidence and test it on yourself rather than relying on it
Diet fit
Where it fits
Swap ideas
More alternatives
FAQ
Common questions about Damson plum
Why do damsons cause bloating or loose stools?
Sorbitol. Damson grades at the top of our polyol scale, and sorbitol is absorbed slowly and incompletely in the small intestine. What is left draws water into the bowel and then ferments in the colon, which produces the familiar sequence of gurgling, cramp, wind and urgency a couple of hours after eating. The effect is dose-dependent, so a spoonful of jam and a bowl of stewed damsons are not the same test.
Are damsons low FODMAP?
No. Damson is high FODMAP, with polyols as the dominant group and moderate excess fructose behind them. Gooseberry or clementine are far gentler if you want the same sharp, tart note in a low-polyol form.
Does damson gin still contain the fruit sorbitol?
Yes, some of it. Steeping pricked damsons in sugared spirit for months extracts the water-soluble compounds, colour and flavour along with the fruit sugars. Straining out the fruit removes the pulp, not the sorbitol that already dissolved. Treat a damson liqueur as carrying both a polyol load and an alcohol load.
Are damsons high in histamine or salicylates?
Damson grades clean for histamine content and for histamine liberation, so it is not a typical low-histamine diet problem. It also grades clean on salicylates in our data, which is worth noting as an outlier because the common plum grades moderate. If you are salicylate sensitive, log damson as an individual test rather than assuming it is safe.
References
Read the background
Ratings reflect the Triggerbites ingredient database and may vary with portion size and preparation.