Rhubarb will always remind me of home. I associate it with dads and small back gardens, quite often the only attempt to grow something edible along with the bamboo pyramids erected for green beans, the tendrils entwining around the canes, bearing stringy, quite bitter vegetables. Rhubarb always had the most beautiful colour; pale pink with blushes of crimson and fuchsia tinged leaves, often huge. It was usually made into a sweet dish, a pie or crumble and that was fine. Ice cream or cream would melt like lava once poured onto the hot pie and custard, already boiling, would drip it's way into the crust and meld with the filling. For us kids, copious amounts of sugar would be added to tease out the sweetness, but as we got older, less would be used to let the fruit's natural tartness shine through and balance out the flavour; acquired tastes for adults. The Rhubarb Triangle in the North of England lends an air of mystery to the fruit, akin to the notorious place of a similar name where ships and planes go missing, (I once also read that this strange phenomenon also happens on trains in England, with doors flying open - although an Internet search revealed nothing).
More often than not now, when I need a recipe or inspiration, I go on line, too many cookbooks to browse through. In this case, though, a recipe jumped at me from the pages of a magazine: Edible Vancouver, to be precise and I immediately wanted to make it, intrigued by some of the slightly strange instructions and ingredients. This recipe not only produced a pie that Neil declared one of the best ever, but also actually taught me several things about pie-making, and there's not many recipes that can boast that.
Firstly, the recipe for the pastry included a large ratio of butter to flour, so much so, in fact, that I hardly had to add any water to make a dough, I was dubious, but it worked beautifully, creating a flaky, buttery crust that immediately made me realise how the flour / fat ratio works: more fat, more flake. (Obvious now I come to think about it). Also, the addition of vinegar to the crust seemed strange, but again, this provided a lesson in how a few drops can keep the gluten strands shorter - hence, a more tender, flaky crust.
Thirdly, the rhubarb itself needed no prior cooking before being baked in the crust, simply mixed with lots of sugar and sprinkled with cornflour, (another first for me). This meant the pie needed longer cooking than I would have thought necessary, but it didn't over-brown or burn at all. The cornflour thickened and gelled the juices, (of which there were plenty due to 1.5 cups of sugar teasing them out).
So, to recap, what I learnt: (These may be very obvious to you, but for me they were real 'moments').
1. When making a pie crust, using more butter or fat will produce a flakier, more tender crust. Less fat and more water will produce a harder crust.
2. Adding a few drops of vinegar to the water for the crust will help to keep the gluten strands shorter and also produce a flakier crust.
3. The fruit to be added to a pie can be raw and simply mixed with sugar before being baked, (no need to pre-boil or bake). The pie can then be baked for as much as an hour without becoming too dark or browning. (Some foil wrapped around the edges will prevent initial burning).
4. Sprinkling cornflour over the raw fruit and sugar will ensure that the juices will sufficiently gel and become almost gelatinous once cooked and cooled, leaving you with a more substantial pie filling.
Recipe : Rhubarb pie
Pasty
2.25 cups of all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup cold butter, cut into small pieces
1/4 cup cold water
1 tbsp white vinegar
Sieve the flour and salt into a large bowl and add the butter. Using your hands, rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs. Mix the water and vinegar together in a jug and add just enough to bring the dough together until it forms a lump and leaves the bowl clean. Form into a ball, wrap in cling wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
After 30 minutes, remove from the fridge and cut into two equal pieces. Roll out one half on a floured surface into a circle approx. 1/4 inch thick. Use this to line a greased and floured pie dish.
Filling
3.5 cups rhubarb, trimmed of all leaves and cut into chunks
1.25 cups of sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
Place the rhubarb into a bowl and add the sugar.
Mix together well. It will seem like there is an inordinate amount of sugar, but rhubarb is a very tart vegetable and needs quite a bit of help to sweeten up.
Pile the rhubarb into the pie dish and spread out evenly. Sprinkle all the cornflour over the top, (again there seems like a lot, but it will help to make a nice jam-like filling). Roll out the second piece of pastry as the first and lay over the top of the pie, sealing the edges by pinching with your fingers. Make 2 or 3 slits into the top to allow steam to escape. (The magazine recipe recommended laying a thin 1/2 inch strip of foil around the edges before baking to prevent over browning).
Bake the pie initially at 450oF for 12 - 15 minutes, then remove the foil and reduce the oven heat to 350oF. Bake for a further 40 - 50 minutes, (no need to remove it while the oven is cooling to the lower temperature), until the crust is golden brown on top and the rhubarb is soft.
Allow to cool completely before cutting and serving.
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