May 21, 2006

Recipe News: Rhubarb recipes springing up again

"This really delicious recipe for apple rhubarb pie came along early last summer after we featured some rhubarb dessert here. But my rhubarb was already getting stringy and I didn't want to use any more of it. So I thought, 'I'll hold onto this,' because, you see, I never throw away any of the recipes you send me and sure enough, didn't it come in handy this week?! My rhubarb is coming up strongly and looking very fine.

Now, one of the things I do for fun is concoct dishes using the first of something with the last of something from our garden and stored food supply. For example, I like to make a potato salad with the last two or three potatoes from last year's garden with the new potatoes from this year's crop (even if it means the older potatoes are all wrinkled and not what you call prime.) Or a salad with the last bit of last year's stored cabbage with the first salad greens of this year. (By now, I bet you are thinking that I ought to get a life.) Well, I think it is fun, and this pie fit right into the pattern because to make it, I used the remainder of last fall's apples with the first picking of this year's rhubarb!

Most of us can get apples year round at the store, but rhubarb still tends to be a somewhat seasonal fruit even in commercial chain stores. The apples I used, though, were from an old biennial apple tree. They are very good flavored and keep beautifully. A few collapsed over the winter in a brown and mucky heap, but the rest stayed quite firm and very sweet."

Includes recipe for:

Apple Rhubarb Pie

Full article here.