Firestone

Patience is not a virtue that I have in spades. In contrast to the other six it is the hardest one for me, as it involves sending the good in you out into the universe and waiting on a response. Maybe it is a chance for introspection and contemplation, or it is a time to go stir crazy by feeling trapped in limbo.

In times like these I try to find distractions, whether these by activities such as the Karneval der Kulturen that was on this weekend, or watching the Eurovision Song Contest for the first time, or thinking about what to do with two stalks of rhubarb that have been lounging on the kitchen counter without purpose. As rhubarb is not very common in South Africa, before coming to Germany I hadn't really considered cooking or baking with it, and don't know what one traditionally does with the reddish stalks. Last week I made Jamie Oliver's Stewed Rhubarb, where all you do is cook the rhubarb with some orange juice, ginger and sugar, which I then ate with yoghurt as a breakfast alternative to post toasties.

Rhubarb compote with orange and ginger. 

Previously, I had delved into rhubarb syrup and a wonderful rhubarb panna cotta tart, but this not being my home and not really having and kitchen utensils (people, it is soooo much easier working with cups and teaspoons than it is with grams and scales) I kind of winged a little something something with the two rhubarb stalks.

Preparations and a random Tidal playlist since I still have a week of free music left. 

Taking this Rhubarb Buckle recipe from the BBC as inspiration, I used fairly random measurements as the scale's batteries no longer work and I improvised with a coffee cup. Also, I added a slab of dark chocolate and used orange juice instead of an actual orange because I didn't have one.

The four parts: base dough top left, then chocolate, oat crumble and rhubarb with orange juice. 

What it looked like before it went into the oven for 45 minutes.

It all seems fairly simple, and assembling the various layers really is not a difficult task. The problem arose (literally) when I noticed the bottom dough had completely swallowed up the crumble layer. Also, a knife inserted at about 30 minutes came out clean, so I took the cake out for fear of over-baking it and ending up with something that tastes like eating a desert and not a dessert. Haha.

What a slightly undercooked piece looks like.

But then the taste test (read my gluttony) revealed the cake still being overly moist. It went in again, and now it is still moist enough (thanks rhubarb) but not undercooked as the previous piece had been. The dark choc also works really well, but somehow I think the recipe needs a bit of tweaking, or me actually using the correct measuring utensils and not winging the exact science that is baking.

I'd say not a complete flop but it you want to impress the people at work or a weekend barbecue I'd rather say make this celebration chocolate mousse cake:

Strawbear

I never got what one does with rhubarb. They were strange celery-like stalks and I imaged them to taste horrible. Like celery, only with a red hue. Then as I got older maybe I was more inclined to test other ingredients in the kitchen, and thus I once bought a bunch of rhubarb in Fruit & Veg for R15. I think I made a strawberry-rhubarb pie, not quite trusting the stalks to taste like anything edible on their own.

Rhubarb syrup?

Rhubarb season has started here and I embraced it completely. I made rhubarb and grapefruit syrup, then rhubarb-strawberry jam, then a jar of rhubarb compote and lastly a wonderful rhubarb panna cotta tart that looked and tasted incredible. I had rhubarb coming out of my ears by the end of it, but it was worth it. Everyone complemented the panna cotta tart and I ended up using the left-over champagne from my birthday with the last bit of rhubarb syrup as a cocktail, which worked really well. And now when my mom and sister come in three weeks I am totally super prepared for breakfast :)

Step 1 for the panna cotta

Rhubarb in the oven with WINE? Hells yes. 

This was super easy. And delicioussss. 

The tart bottom chilling in my window sill. 

Badaboom Badabang. 

Rhubarber

I have never cooked with rhubarb.
It is strange to me that these green-pink stalks can become anything delicious.
However, the other day a bunch of rhubarb only cost R 9.99 at Fruit 'n Veg so I grabbed a bunch and headed home to find out what one could do with them.

I found a whole selection of recipes on smittenkitchen and through foodgawker, but they all appeared to take a lot of time and I prefer mixing something, throwing it in the oven and taking it out hours later to marvel at how tasty and beautiful it looks.

So ultimately, I adapted smittenkitchen's original recipe:

Strawberry-Rhubarb Crumble

Yields 6 to 8 servings.

For the topping:
1 1/3 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons Demerara sugar (or turbinado sugar aka Sugar in the Raw)
Zest of one lemon
1/4 pound (1 stick or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, melted

For the filling:
1 1/2 cups rhubarb, chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 quart strawberries plus a few extras, hulled, quartered
Juice of one lemon
1/2 cup sugar
3 to 4 tablespoons cornstarch (some commenters found the flour option a little too, well, floury so this has been updated)
Pinch of salt

1. Heat oven to 375°F. Prepare topping: In a mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, sugars and lemon zest and add the melted butter. Mix until small and large clumps form. Refrigerate until needed.

2. Prepare filling: Toss rhubarb, strawberries, lemon juice, sugar, cornstarch and a pinch of salt in a 9-inch deep-dish pie plate. (I used an oval dish this time, because they fit better in the bottom of a shopping bag.)

3. Remove topping from refrigerator and cover fruit thickly and evenly with topping. Place pie plate on a (foil-lined, if you really want to think ahead) baking sheet, and bake until crumble topping is golden brown in places and fruit is bubbling beneath, about 40 to 50 minutes.

So, instead, for the topping, I did this: 

3/4 cup flour

1/2 cup light brown sugar

150ml oats ( slightly more than half a cup)

1ts cinnamin

1ts nutmeg

 ( I wing these until it looks to be the right amount)

100g cold butter

100g chopped walnuts ( I usually just use whichever nuts I have, and am not too specific about the amount)

Place everything except the nuts together in a bowl ( it would be wise to cut the butter into small squares) and rub it all until it is crumbly. You could also do this with a food processor but I like the way your fingers have to rub everything together. 

Add the nuts and mix it well. It should be like slightly wet sand. 

For the Filling: 

I used about 6 stalks of rhubarb

one large Woolies punnet of strawberries ( think that should be round 600g)

Added 3 TB of lemon juice

3 TB of cornflour

1/4 cup sugar

Cut the rhubarb into small pieces ( about 1cm thick) and also cut the strawberries. Place the fruit in a bowl and add the remaining ingredients. Mix everything carefully and make sure everything is well coated. I would adjust the sugar depending on how sweet the strawberries are and how sweet you want your crumble to be. 

Then I placed the fruit in the bottom of an oven-proof dish and crumbled the sandy dough evenly over it. 

Bake for about 40-50 minutes, and whambam: delicious. 

Instead of rhubarb, you could also use frozen berries or apples or pears or nectarines or peaches or plums. Hmmmmm you could basically take any fruit. Imagine a cherry crumble. 

To finish the crumble of I added a scoop of frozen mixed berry yoghurt ( available at Woolworths, where else).

My sister did appreciate it.

nom nom nom