Rhubarb

[altivo]

One good thing from all this rain, it has made the rhubarb grow lush. First rhubarb pie of the season today, yummy. No strawberries yet so I put in an orange, which turned out quite nicely.

Also sourdough bread, 50% whole wheat. Fragrant and tasty.

Back to the great Linux conversion tomorrow. Should be all over with in another day or two.

Comments

[vimsig.livejournal.com]

mmmm- rhubarb!

[niko-winterset.livejournal.com]

*noses* How odd that you mention rhubarb. A friend of mine and I were just talking about that last night.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh I dunno as it's so odd. :) 'Tis the season when we eagerly munch up anything that comes up green after the long winter deprivation.

Rhubarb is funny stuff. The leaves and roots are toxic so we only eat the stems. I always wonder how things like that got figured out, but probably I don't want to know, really.

Anyway, rhubarb pie is a perennial favorite here. We make it several ways.

[nekura-ca.livejournal.com]

Mmmm... Rhubarb pie is one of my favourite, the only problem is, it's just me and my grandma who like it, no-one else in the family, nor any of my friends, will go any where near it, so I don't get to eat it too often.

I also really like stewed rhubarb, and with the simple, "mix rhubarb, water, sugar, boil till it's mush," instructions, it's one of the few things I can actually cook successfully ^_^

Homemade bread, always good.

[zenicurean.livejournal.com]

How can someone not like homemade rhubarb stew or pie? The mind boggles.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, I know people who don't like fruit (any fruit) and more people who don't like vegetables (except for french fries) so I guess it isn't surprising.

Even just the people who refuse to try anything new are likely to reject rhubarb. All the more for those of us who like it, though.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Time for you to learn to make your own rhubarb pie, then. It's not hard at all. Ask your grandma to teach you her way, that's the most fun. She may laugh at first, but I'll bet she'll show you.

I consider saving family recipes to be really important. Otherwise they get lost when the oldest generation passes away, and that's very sad indeed.

[calydor.livejournal.com]

Indeed. A lot of old recipes died with my grandmother.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes. A number of my father's favorite things were lost with his mother and we never managed to reconstruct them.

As a result, I made a point of cooking with my other grandmother, and with Gary's surviving grandmother. We wrote everything down, and whenever they went to toss in a pinch of something or half a handful, I stuck a cup under and measured it first. As a result, we can now make some of his family's favorite things that would have been lost when she passed away in 1996. She was 91 by then, I think, and nearly blind. Even though she wasn't my own relation, I felt very proud when she would taste something I made from her recipe and pronounced it "just right."

I have no Polish heritage at all, but I now know how to make pierogi and kielbasa from raw ingredients. Gary does a mean kluski. I'm still struggling with the paczki, but I have pickled beets with caraway down pat. ;D

[pokeypony.livejournal.com]

I have spent the better part of my life wondering what a Rhubarb is.

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

It's something that crowds of people used to mutter repeatedly in hushed tones in the 1920's and 1930's on the radio. :-)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I thought it was what happens when baseball players get into an argument with the umpire. Or does that somehow show my age?

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

Meep? Well, that reference I don't get.
I was referring to The Goon Show, and some additional info I found on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goon_Show#Rhubarb.2C_rhubarb.2C_rhubarb.21

[altivo.livejournal.com]

See the link I gave to pokeypony for more details.

Yes. It's baseball slang for a dispute between players and the umpire. The announcer usually says something like "Uh oh, looks like we have a bit of a rhubarb going on."

[altivo.livejournal.com]

More than you ever wanted to know about rhubarb.

[songcoyote.livejournal.com]

I LOVE rhubarb pie! Especially with strawberries, though an orange sounds good too. Yum!

Yet another thing we both like to eat ;)

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Come visit and we'll have rhubarb. :) I like it in cakes and muffins too.

[songcoyote.livejournal.com]

Well, you'd certainly be a lot less spendy to visit than that last person I met online that I wanted to meet; she lives in Australia!

To put it simply, though, this year is unlikely to be good for travel for me, but next year is a possibility, and one I'd like to research. When's the best time (in your opinion) to visit?

Also, should we continue this conversation in e-mail?

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote

[altivo.livejournal.com]

E-mail is OK or here as far as I'm concerned. Best time depends on what you like. Autumn color is usually gorgeous around here, but hard to time for that if you have to plan far ahead. Spring and fall are generally the most comfortable times, though in the summer we have county fairs and other open air stuff. The summer humidity can be pretty unpleasant unless you are used to such things though. Late summer and autumn are best for eating of course, that's when all the fresh produce and apples and stuff come around. ;D

[typographer.livejournal.com]

We've had such a weird winter and spring, that I was making rhubarb things over a month ago.

I didn't make a pie, though. Sauce and cheesecake, but not a pie.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Is that earlier than usual for rhubarb there? It's one of the earliest spring vegetables, and I thought you were zone 6 which should put you a month ahead of me here.

Cheesecake... Hmm, I hadn't thought of that. Probably shouldn't anyway. ;p

[deffox]

It's been years since I've had rhubarb pie.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

It's not that hard to find if you want some.

[deffox]

My parents always have a couple plants in their garden. Maybe Memorial weekend I can ask them about it.

[porsupah.livejournal.com]

What a coinkydink! Yakitate Japan's current story revolves around the making of rhubarb jam. ^_^ Not something I'm fond of, although I've not tried the vegetable in quite a few years, so it's entirely possible I might quite go for it now.

Wholewheat sourdough? Ooh, that could be very good.. I've virtually never seen any sourdough but bright white. (Though the garlic & rosemary variety I found from one Bay Area bakery made quite excellent toast - good enough to just crunch on dry!)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yep, sourdough is quite good enough to eat plain, though a little butter or cheese really complements it nicely too. Our whole wheat version is basically just like San Francisco white, except that a third of the flour is replace by whole wheat. (Not all, because 100% whole wheat bread is generally as heavy as lead: it doesn't rise well.) We also like sourdough pancakes and waffles, both of which I make with whole wheat.