Rhubarb Cup: A Delightful Springtime Dessert from the 1940s

Our rhubarb is is growing by leaps and bounds each day. And I still had a bag of chopped rhubarb in the deep freeze from last season to use. Oops! Well, no time like the present to cook that up.

The other evening I made Rhubarb Cup, which is basically individual pre-cooked rhubarb compotes topped with a sweetened biscuit, each, and baked in custard cups. I used a scone dough recipe for the sweet biscuit topping. 

I had enough rhubarb that I could have baked a pie. But I thought I'd rather do cups with biscuit topping as biscuit dough is lower in fat than pie pastry, and I could incorporate some whole wheat flour in the biscuit dough, making this dessert slightly healthier than pie.

During WW2, opting for cobblers or crisps over making pies or cakes was a great way to spare precious butter (or other rationed fats) and sugar, and still produce a tasty dessert. My grandmother was raising 3 growing children during World War 2. Sunday dinner was the one time per week dessert was served. When butter went on ration around 1943 in the US, my grandmother, and other women at the time, had to shift gears when it came to cooking. Substitutions were made in recipes, and in some instances, certain types of recipes became more popular as they naturally used less of the rationed foods than others. Cobbler and crisps were types of desserts that grew in popularity for this reason.

My grandmother made "cups" as she called them, using whatever fresh fruit she could obtain and named it according to that fruit. "Cups" were baked as individual servings in custard cups, hence the name. They moved frequently for my grandfather's work. As a result, what was available changed from year to year. When they lived where peaches were abundant in summer, my grandmother made Peach Cup. When they moved to a place where wild blueberries were free for the picking in summer and apples came to the house in bushel baskets in the fall, she made Blueberry Cup or Apple Cup. When their family returned to Utah at the end of the war, my grandmother had access to her father's large and well-tended garden, which included several rhubarb plants. Rhubarb Cup made its way to the weekly menu in spring.

When I went to make something with my frozen rhubarb, I remembered my grandmother and her fruit dessert "cups." In that moment, a Rhubarb Cup sounded so appealing. My grandmother took the time to use a biscuit cutter to make neat little circles of dough to top each serving. I took the easy way out and made wedges of dough cut from a round. They tasted delicious, and my family devoured them. I think I'll make more cup desserts this season as a way to use some of our abundant garden fruit. 

Does nostalgia prompt you to cook or bake particular dishes? Do you have a memory of something your grandmother cooked or baked that you like to make now?

The Gift of Some Gooseberries

I mentioned that my son and daughter-in-law had given me some spending money to use at a particular nursery for my birthday a year ago. I also said we finally got around to going there on my birthday this year. Well, I thought I'd show you what I bought with that money.

It's a gooseberry plant. I had read about gooseberries in a NW plant catalog some years back. Apparently, they've had their share of controversy in the plant world over the last 100 years. For a time, they were completely banned in the US, as the plant is a host to a disease affecting white pine trees. By the 1960s, it was apparent that gooseberries (and their cousins currants) don't pose an issue for disease on a large scale in most of the US. So the federal government lifted the ban and allowed states to choose whether to ban them or not. Gooseberries and currants are still banned or restricted in many parts of the East Coast of the US. However, much of the US legalized both following the lifting of the federal ban. If you haven't heard of or ever seen gooseberries, this could be part of it. 

My son and daughter-in-law told me they'd seen them in Whole Foods and some farmer's markets in summer. I find it intriguing that enough folks in my area are interested in this fruit. The fruits are not long-keepers, but will store up to 2 or 3 weeks in the fridge. They are primarily used in preserves, pies, crumbles, and fools (a creamy dessert with added fruit). They are also cooked into a sauce as an addition to meat and fish. When fully ripe, they are sweet enough to eat out of hand or added to fruit compotes. Gooseberries are about the size of a grape each. For the most part, this fruit is most popular in the UK, northern Europe, and Scandinavia.

Our day at the nursery was fun and very interesting. This is the largest complex of greenhouses that I've ever been to. Many of the greenhouses are connected to each other, yet they are all climate controlled for the needs of different plants. We visited a large tropical greenhouse with plants that favor warm and humid environments, including banana plants and orchids. We also passed through the warm and dry greenhouse and saw several varieties of cacti. There was a large heated, humidity-neutral greenhouse where I found tomato, pepper, squash and pumpkin plants. It's still a little too early to plant those out in the garden, so a warm greenhouse was appropriate for their needs right now. I also spent time in the unheated greenhouse and checked out their cool season vegetable starts. They had everything I could think of growing in those greenhouses, both edible and ornamental. 

When I casually asked an employee if they thought they might carry gooseberry bushes, I was pleasantly surprised when she said yes and directed me to the right greenhouse. Once in that greenhouse, another employee directed me to an outdoor area just to the back and showed me a selection of about 8 different gooseberry varieties. Gooseberry plants can be very thorny, so I selected a variety that is mostly thornless (it still had a couple of thorns on the stems, though). I also looked for one that was characterized as large and sweet. If you've ever picked blueberries or other similar-sized berries, you know that it's easier to pick larger fruit than tiny fruit. I don't want to create too much extra work for myself.

Anyway, I got the  gooseberry bush planted this afternoon. We're expecting a couple of days of rain, so my new plant should get watered-in well. My new little plant has blossoms forming already. With some luck, we should be able to enjoy some gooseberries this summer.

Best (purchased) gift ever -- something to help me grow food for my family.

Have you ever had gooseberries? Have you ever heard of gooseberries?