Tuesday, May 28, 2013

It's Rhubarb Season!!

Our rhubarb plants have been taken over by the wild black raspberry vines here this year ... I love BOTH!  But am sorry that we weren't able to harvest more rhubarb. 

This was all I could find so far under the sharp vines ...

After I washed them off and chopped them up... this is all I ended up with to put in the freezer ... unfortunately, they will be used up in the cakes we love to make with them in less than two months!

Here is the great recipe I call "John's Mom's Rhubarb Cake Recipe", but it is actually great with many kinds of fruit.  If you use a fruit other than rhubarb, you have to be careful and experiment with how much water to add in the final stage before baking, so it doesn't overflow...some fruits are juicier than others I guess?

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John's Mom's Rhubarb Cake

Put 2 cups (or a little more) chopped fresh rhubarb
(or you can use frozen too) on the bottom of a baking dish or pan.

Mix together in a separate bowl:
3/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons of shortening (Crisco)
1 cup of flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup of milk (add a little more if the batter seems too dry)

Spread the above mixture over the top of the rhubarb in the baking dish.

Top the batter and rhubarb with a mixture (mixed in a separate bowl) of:
1 cup of sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon cinnamin

Pour carefully over the top of it all,  1 cup of boiling water.
(if it looks like the 1 cup of water is going to overflow a pan
then just use enough to not overflow the pan or baking dish -
it's a real mess in your oven if it does drip over -
use tin foil on the bottom of a baking sheet to prevent spills).

Bake for approx. 45-50 minutes at 375 degrees (a little longer if you double the recipe
for a larger baking dish).

The hardest part of all this is waiting for it to cool so you can eat it!

This is what the finished cakes should look like... yummmmm! 

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