Sweeten up rhubarb in delicious desserts

It may have been my imagination, but it seems to me every time I have turned around lately, someone asked me if I needed any rhubarb. Darn stuff was like zucchini. I have four plants, and so had plenty for rhubarb crisp and rhubarb chutney, but I thought it would be nice to do something a little different.

I have a cookbook from 1833 that describes rhubarb pies as “dear” because cooks needed so much costly sugar to make it palatable. Sugar isn’t so expensive anymore, but rhubarb still needs sweetening up. Mixing strawberries and rhubarb always seemed like a good idea, but to tell the truth, I so much enjoy those first juicy local strawberries that I kind of hate to waste them on rhubarb. Miriam Hart in Hamden and Lucile White in Bangor both had a good way to jazz up rhubarb and sweeten it at the same time.

Mim suggested making rhubarb sauce by filling a two quart pan with cut up rhubarb, adding one cup of water, and simmering until the rhubarb was really soft. “Dissolved” is how she described it, which makes a good mental image. Then she adds one 3-ounce package of raspberry Jell-O, and a half cup of sugar, and stirs till it is blended. She lets that cool. “Not fancy,” she wrote, but seems to satisfy me.” You could use strawberry Jell-O, if you like.

Lucile’s Rhubarb Strawberry Dessert reminded me of cottage pudding, that simple cake-like mix you spread over fruit to bake for a simple dessert. This is flexible enough that you can cut back the sugar a bit; in fact, I used only three-quarters of a cup full.

Looking for …

Orange Parfait anyone?

Peggy Drinkwater of Greenbush is looking for a recipe her grandmother used to make. “She called it Orange Parfait. It was made in a pan about the size of a brownie pan. It had a graham cracker crust. The filling was make with orange Jell-o, oranges, and, I think, canned milk, and it was mixed together, not layered.”

Sharon in Surry is looking for dinner rolls.

Send queries or answers to Sandy Oliver, 1061 Main Road, Islesboro 04848. For recipes, tell us where they came from. List ingredients, specify number of servings and do not abbreviate measurements. Include name, address and daytime phone number.

Rhubarb Strawberry Dessert

4 cups of chopped rhubarb

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 three-ounce package of dry strawberry Jello

2 tablespoons quick tapioca

1 Jiffy dry cake mix, yellow or white (for 8-inch cake)

1 cup of water

1/3 cup melted butter or margarine

Grease a 9-by-13-inch pan, and pre-heat oven to 350 F. Spread the rhubarb in the pan, and sprinkle the sugar, Jello, and tapioca over it. Then sprinkle the dry cake mix over the top of that. Add the water, and drizzle the butter over all. Bake for 50 minutes. Serve plain or with whipped cream.

Alternatively, if you don’t have some Jiffy Cake Mix, try this. The result is a bit like strawberry rhubarb shortcake, only with the shortcake on top. Well, you could always flip it over in the dish, right? Follow the recipe above through to the point where you add the cake mix.

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup butter (or one stick)

2 eggs, beaten

1 3/4 cups cake flour

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/3 cup milk

Cream the sugar and butter together, and add the eggs, mixing well. Sift together the dry ingredients and mix into the butter and sugar mixture alternatively with the milk. If it seems too stiff to spread, add a bit more milk, then drop on top of the rhubarb mixture, and spread it a bit with a spatula. Bake at 350 F for 45 minutes or until the cake is golden.