exposure by Judith Hausman
vanilla extract - poach rhubarb with Indian meal - cardamum cookie .
I take the air past a pieplant maculation in ( let ’s call her ) Mrs. Bloom ’s grounds intimately every day . Two years ago , I catch that while she is a wonderful gardener well into her 80s , Mrs. Bloom was not draw her rhubarb . The gnarly blossom stalk was unfurling and the tall , almost prehistoric , angry walk were get red , but it seemed to be kick the bucket to waste .
One day , I fall into temptation . The gate to her lawn was open and her car was gone so here ’s what I did : I stole some rhubarb plant .
I know I should have asked her first , but I did n’t . I chop and cooked the half 12 stalks with powdered ginger and honey . middling soon , I was wracked with guilt . ( Well , maybe not enough to keep me from loving that compote . )
Mrs. Bloom ’s rhubarb gone to flower .
Vanilla-poached rhubarb with cornmeal-cardamom biscuits.
But in the end at our yearly community snap , I confess to Mrs. Bloom that I had helped myself to her rhubarb . Of course , she laugh ; she had just been chiding her grown son ( “ You never write , you never call . You never eat my rhubarb . ” ) for not eating it , and she was planning to draw in out one of the big , gallant plant life . I never did intercept back that year ( more guilt ) but I resolve to do so the next spring . This sentence , could I make her a pie in return ? She waved me off . A pie was too much for her to eat alone , she tell , but she ’d take some cocotte , pale immature jam instead .
This year , she had my kettle of fish jarful ready to return to me . Mrs. Bloom ’s pieplant , basking in its gay daub in the front of the garden , was ready before anyone else ’s . I used it to make rhubarb compote at Rainbeau Ridge for the farm ’s CSA . We cook the first batch gently in orange juice and pep and then after chill it a slight , sweetened it with local honey .
Next fourth dimension , I ’ll poach it in white wine-coloured with a substantial vanilla bean and nutmeg . These are the two palette I like with pieplant , which I can then swirl into yogurt or ice emollient , top with granola or almonds , layer into a from - wampum or cheat pie case over creamy , light dulcify goat cheese or vanilla custard . Some people like to rust it with roast pork or volaille as a angelical - tart relish , too .
There ’s another part to the rhubarb plant story . Because I live in an older lake residential area , I bang people other than Mrs. Bloom had old - fashioned rhubarb patches , too , so I used our community e - bulletin board to e - pass around a call to corrupt any pieplant that was up and extra . I figure nobody would like to see the bright red , first fruit , with its poisonous elephant - ear leave-taking , go to waste . My neighbors were happy to give it to me and would n’t take a dime .
That ’s part of what I make out about my residential area : The other bounty of rhubarb plant and the good neighbour ready to share it .
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