Rhubarb & Strawberry Delight

Rhubarb is generally cooked and prepared like fruits -- but it is actually a vegetable.  I call it pucker food due to its tartness.  

Only the stalk which looks like celery, is edible.  Loaded with vitamin A and C, potassium and calcium.  Some even say it's a superfood for its ratio of health benefits to calories.  7 calories per 100 grams. High levels of calcium means it is a fat-free alternative to dairy products which lowers cholesterol and it actually speeds up metabolism.  

The leaves are toxic as they are loaded with oxalic acid.  So you don't cook rhubarb in aluminium, copper or iron pan as the rhubarb will turn brownish and the pan discolors. The toxicity is not wasted as it may be used as pesticide. Just boil a bunch of leaves with water, let cool, sieve and use as spray on plants.  

This 'vegetable' is often used in cakes, tarts, jams, sauces as well as compote.  

Here is one of my favourite -- rhubarb strawberry compote with fresh cheese flavoured with limocello, a lemon liquor.

Ingredients for the rhubarb compote

• 4 tbsp caster sugar
• 1 vanilla pod, split lengthways
• 500 g rhubarb, trimmed, washed and cut into 2cm chunks
• 100 ml orange juice or water
• 100 g caster sugar (more or less to own taste)
• 100 g fresh strawberries, cleaned, hulled and halved.

Make the compote

1. Place 4 tbsp caster sugar in a pan.
2. Heat sugar over low heat.
3. As soon as sugar is caramelized, add vanilla pod and orange juice.
4. Simmer till caramel dissolves.
5. Add rhubarb and low simmer for 5 minutes.
6. Remove from heat, cover and set aside to chill.

Ingredients for the fresh cheese

• 200 g fresh cheese (Quark)
• Zest from 1 lemon
• 100 g powdered sugar
• 200 ml whipped cream
• 1-2 tbsp Limoncello (optional)

Make the cheese

1. Mix thoroughly cheese, lemon zest and powdered sugar.
2. Carefully fold in whipped cream.
3. Serve rhubarb compote in a bowl, with a good healthy scoup of cheese, dribbled over with limoncello.

Caramelized sugar with vanilla pod.

Add rhubarb and low simmer.

Add strawberries to chilled compote.

Rhubarb Apple Crumble with Cheese Cream Cake

It is rhubarb season !  This incredibly sour fruit or vegetable was a stranger to me ...... until I came to Germany.  I cannot explain my facination with this 'stem'.  It's tartness as pink gooey mess of compote or baked, replacing apples.

 Look at the thickness -  1 stem weigh at least 350g.   Rhubarb season is short.  How short ?  Generally, soon as strawberry appears, it's arrivedeci rhubarb.  What I usually do is, cut the trimmed rhubarb into 2cm (1 inch) pieces,  pack them into 1kg bags and deep freeze them.  Imagine....having rhubarb compote in winter.    The tartness will make your toes curl and straighten afro hair at the same time. 

Rhubarb Tart

You know it's spring when you find stalks of rhubarb in the market.  I picked a few young tender stalks from my garden to bake a part egg and part 'fruit' tart. 

Can you believe it.....this 'vegetable' rhubarb was officially declared a FRUIT in 1947 

  

Pastry:    Mix following ingredients to form a paliable dough.
150g butter
50g sugar
200g allpurpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 egg (large)


Filling:  Mix filling (except rhubarb) till sugar is dissolved.
300g rhubarb (cleaned and diced)
150g sugar
400ml cream
3 eggs (large)
1 tsp vanilla essence
pinch of salt


Set oven temperature at 200°C

My lazy way of making the crust without making a mess.  Put everything into a freezer bag, close it and start kneading to form dough.  When done, do not take dough out.
Just roll dough inside the bag into desired thickness with a rolling pin. 
   
  
Open up bag, sprinkle some flour on surface of dough to detach from bag.  Cut bag open on one side and flip dough into baking pan.  Viola !!         

Remove bag and press dough into pan.  Neaten the edges.










Arrange rhubarb in pan and add mixture of cream, sugar and eggs, etc. Bake at lower case at 200°C for  30 mins. Thereafter, 15 mins at 160°C. 

Winter Food Series: Today, Delicious Rhubarb CrumbCake!

Preparing the Rhubarb Filling

Pre-baked Base Crumbs

Spreading Rhubarb on Crumbs

Readied Whipped Egg-White

Luvly Layers

A Piece for You!

Winter. Not only nature, even homosapiens go into hibernation....active hibernation. Foggy days. Icy evenings. Freezing nights. Icy roads. No, No !! Nothing will make me go out.

Germans love to eat Rhubarb .....in various ways. Their favorite is named "Rhabarberkuchen". It's a crumb cake or tart made with rhubarb (though that's neither fruit nor vegetable). Rhubarb flourish very well in my garden. Probably because it is growing right beside my compost. I harvested lots last spring and froze them. Snipe away the huge leafs (they're fairly hairly). What's left are the stalks, thick as a thumb (or a big toe, at least) and arm long. Wait till next spring, then I'll post you some nice-nice rhubarb pictures!

Sour stuff, I tell ya! Don't try to eat them raw. In the past I've used rhubarb to pep up my Tom-Yum Soups when I ran out of lemons.

To cut a long story short: you peel the skin off the stalks, cut it into 1-2 inch long pieces, and then portion them into 500 gram bags for the freezer.

Last Saturday there was no more fresh fruits nor veggies in my fridge. Been hibernating since New Year, remember ? Opened up the freezer; out fell a bag with rhubarb. Been itching to bake something anyway, so rhubarb cake it will be!

One delicious rhubarb cake

Prepare the cake filling

• 1 kg frozen rhubarb
• 100 gm sugar
• 1 tbsp cornstarch
• 2 tbsp water
• ....cook! But how?

First defrost (can do over night).

Pour the juice (there will be enough after defrosting), and only the juice into a small sauce pan.

Add sugar.

Cook juice with sugar.

Once it's boiling, mix cornstarch with 2 tbsp of water.

Remove pan from heat. Add the cornstarch-water-mix to thicken juice.

Gently add in defrosted rhubarb pieces.

Do not cook again, and do not "over-mix". We want to keep the pieces, and don't want to turn it into mush.

Set aside and let it cool down.

Why the cornstarch? It prevents the later cake filling turning out too soggy.

Make the base

• 150 gm butter (don't use margarine)
• 100 gm flour
• 200 gm almond meal
• a pinch of salt
• 4 egg-yolks

Simply mix-mix until you get crumb-crumbs.

Butter a cake-pan. Spread-spread the crumbs evenly over the pan and bake at 180° C for about 20 minutes. (Temperature adjustments may be needed with different ovens).

While base is baking, whip 4 egg-whites with 4 tbsp of sugar plus 1 tsp of vanilla essence (Germans will use 1 pack of "Vanillezucker").

Whip until very stiff.

Bring out dish from oven. Spread out rhubarb filling on top of baked crumbs. Spread or pipe the whipped egg-whites on top of rhubarb filling.

Place dish back to oven. Bake again. Use 120° C for another 20 minutes. Bake till the top of egg-white start to take colour light brown and become "Baiser".

Eat it whenever you can't curb your lust any longer. If you like, even if cake is still warm.