desserts |

It’s rhubarb season and this year rhubarb in my garden has been growing like crazy! Over the weekend I picked five stalks, two of which weighed almost a pound. I was searching for a good rhubarb dessert recipe and finally decided to go with this one, which I adapted from a German website.

I love rhubarb, but because of its tartness I often pair it up with strawberries. Other recipes with rhubarb only, seem to call for a huge amount of sugar, which I try to avoid as often as possible. This cake, even though with rhubarb only, has a perfect balance of tart in the sponge part and then sweet in the meringue top. It tastes heavenly and I will be making it again this rhubarb season.

I tried to go a little fancy with piping the meringue on the top, but it can be just simply spread over the cake. If you choose to do the piping, I’d suggest to add one more egg white because I ran out of it (one corner of the cake didn’t have meringue on, but I was embarrassed to show it… :D)

Rhubarb Meringue Cake

[Printable recipe]

Ingredients:
• 800 g (1 ¾ lb)Rhubarb
• 1 TBSP sugar
• 125 g (4.4 oz) Sugar
• 125 g (4.4 oz) Butter (room temperature)
• 1 Pack vanilla sugar (or 1 tsp vanilla extract)
• 1/2 Lemon (zest only)
• 1 Pinch of salt
• 3 Large eggs (divided)
• Sugar*** (for meringue – see step 6.)
• 1 Whole egg
• 100 g (3.5 oz) Corn starch
• 100 g (3.5 oz) All-purpose flour
• 2 tsp Baking powder
• 2–3 TBSP Milk
Preparation:
1. Wash and dry rhubarb stalks and cut into ½ inch pieces. Sprinkle with 1 TBSP sugar and set aside in a bowl.
2. Divide eggs and place the egg whites in the fridge.
3. Place butter in a mixer bowl, add sugar, vanilla, salt and lemon zest and mix until fluffy, then add 3 egg yolks and 1 whole egg and mix until is all well incorporated.
4. In another bowl combine flour, corn starch and baking powder and mix well. Start adding it to the egg mixture alternating with milk. The batter will turn out really nice and creamy.
5. Prepare a 13 X 9 inch baking pan. Brush the sides with butter and place parchment paper on the bottom. Place the batter into the pan, spreading evenly. Now place the rhubarb on the top. Bake at 395 F (200 C) for about 25 minutes.

6. While cake is baking take the egg whites out of the fridge and weigh them. The weight of your egg whites will determine the quantity of sugar you will need. (My egg whites weighed 108 grams, so I measured 108 g sugar for my meringue). I learned that by using the same quantity of egg whites and sugar I get the best meringue.

7. Beat the egg whites on high gradually adding sugar for about 3-4 minutes or until soft peaks form. If you turn your bowl upside down they will stay in place.

8. When cake is done, take it briefly out of the oven. Lower the oven temperature to 250 F (120 C). Spread or pipe the meringue on the cake and bake it for another 20-25 minutes.
9. Let it cool and serve.

ENJOY! 🙂

Hello Friends,

It’s bee too long… I have firmly decided that this year will not be as the last. Despite being extremely busy I will find time to get back to my love of baking and sharing my recipes here with you.

This recipe is proven over and over again in my mama’s and my kitchen. It’s from an old French cookbook of 750 pages. More about it you can read here.

You would think something as simple as a crepe can not go wrong, but in my experience it really can if you don’t have a right recipe. They can turn out too thick, too though or kind of chewy. This recipe gives you a perfectly textured, thin crepe that you will want to make again and again. This time I filled them with nutella and served with some ice cream on top.

Next time I will share another way I serve them. In lack of better term I call them “Crepes au gratin”, but more about that in my next post.

Simple Crepes

[Printable recipe]

Yields 12 small or 8 medium crepes

Ingredients:

125 g (1 cup) all-purpose flour
25 g (2 TBSP) vanilla sugar***
A pinch of salt
2 eggs
2 dl (1 cup) milk
30 g (2 TBSP)butter (melted)
1 TBSP rum or brandy

Butter for pan

*** Vanilla sugar can be purchased in most stores with an international section. If you can’t get vanilla sugar, use regular white sugar and add 1 tea spoon of vanilla extract into batter.

Preparation:

Combine flour, vanilla sugar and salt into a medium bowl.
Add eggs and mix at a slow speed, gradually adding milk
At the end add melted butter and 1 TBSP of rum.

I usually don’t use mixer for this batter; I just make sure to whisk eggs very well into the flour so the batter is smooth.

Prepare a 6 – 7 inch pan, put a thin slice of butter on the pan, let it melt and heat well. Pour a 1/2 – 1 ladle of batter onto the pan. Take the pan off the heat and move a few times in a circular motion until all batter is spread evenly over the bottom of the pan.

Place the pan back on heat and allow all batter to change color, then flip a crepe using a thin spatula or if you’re a risk taker throw it in the air and let it flip then catch with the pan. 😀

Stack a crepe on a top of another to keep them warm. I usually cover them with a piece of aluminum foil too. When they are all done, flip the whole stack over and start spreading them with your favorite filling; jam, honey, nutella, nuts, apple butter just to name a few.

Serve warm! Bon Appétit!