Tomorrow is Mother’s Day. With a cyclone “bomb” polar vortex up north we are getting a little “chill” down here in Charleston. I personally love it. This Mother’s Day will not be filled with restaurant reservations filled but truely a deeper understanding of how hard a mother’s job is and how many days it’s thankless and payless. Mother’s don’t go on “paid vacation” and I would venture to say it’s mothers that are holding much of our country together right now. They are cooking the meals, homeschooling the kids and making sure if people have a breakdown that they are okay…so when life gives you lemons you make lemonade right? Or we could say Lemon Bars….better yet, Rhubarb Lemon Bars. That is if you can find rhubarb!!
I was cruising in my Yankee Magazine because I’m still a yankee at heart (and honestly it’s going to take more than 2 years to “de yankify” me) when I came to this beautiful lemon rhubarb bar recipe. I love the color pink. It’s mother’s day, I live with all men so I’m going to pink it up. Last spring looking for rhubarb I asked the local grocer if they had any. He said, “people here don’t know what it is and they don’t know how to use it” so thus they only get it in for a very short time. Alas this year I went to Harris Teeter because I could see if they even carried it online. They did!! So this was my “essential” trip to the grocery store.
You should have seen the check out lady search inquisitively in her price log for WHAT IS THIS look on her face. “That’s RHUBARB and it’s 4.99 a pound,” I said. She asked me what I was using it for….so of course I told her and during this covid craziness she was so intrigued with my blog. I hope she jumps on here and gives them a try!
You will need:
For the shortbread
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 sticks of butter
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 tablespoon salt
For the lemon/rhubarb topping
- 2 cups chopped rhubarb
- 1/4 cup water
- 2/3 cup sugar
- Zest of one to two lemons
- Juice up 3-4 lemons
- 2 eggs plus 2 egg yolks
- 1/3 cup flour
I put the rhubarb, lemon juice, zest, sugar and water on the stovetop to cook over a medium heat first. Cook it for 6-8 minutes and set aside to cool.
Then I make the shortbread cookie base by creaming the butter, adding the sugar, and the flour and salt. It will stick together and form a dough ball. Line a 9×13” baking pan with parchment paper. This is my secret success to baking cookies. Parchment paper prevents over baking. Spread the cookie base evenly with your fingers into the bottom of the pan like a crust. Then you’ll pop that in the oven at 350 degrees for about 8-10 minutes. The top of the cookie crust shouldn’t be brown but be dry.
Meanwhile you’ll blend your cooled rhubarb in a blender until it’s a pink smooth mixture. Beautiful! Then you’ll mix your eggs, add the rhubarb mixture and then the flour. When your crust is out of the oven, you can pour the rhubarb mixture over the cookie crust, spread evenly and pop it back in the oven for 20-25 minutes. You can see in the picture why I use parchment paper!
When done you can let it cool. The way I cut mine was lift the whole thing out with the parchment and cut evenly on a cutting board to my desired size. I sprinkled confectioners sugar to make them pretty. I put six on a plate and took the dog for a walk and they disappeared so I’m guessing all of the quaranteenagers approved of the Friday night baking adventure. And look….they ate rhubarb! So they got in their vegetables! In this recipe the rhubarb was supposed to give the lemon bars a pink color and it did to a certain degree but my lighting wasn’t the best. I wish I had some leftovers to take a picture in the light of day but they were very popular with the quaranteenagers and they are GONE.
A little background in rhubarb! Rhubarb is kind of an old fashioned plant. It’s like celery and the leaves are big and when you research WHY this plant might not be popular in the south….here it is from the farmers almanac. Rhubarb does best where the average temperature falls below 40ºF in the winter and below 75ºF in the summer. Of course that doesn’t happen here often if ever. People have said, “Oh yeah my grandmother used it all the time!” and that’s because it was something that kept growing through the summer probably up north, died away and came back the next year. Similar to asparagus. Apparently you can also lighten your hair with rhubarb….Rhubarb Blonde. So for all you Covid blondes missing your colorist at your salons you might want to try it out!
So for my dear Covid cooking followers that have liked the new No Politics Just Food Facebook page. I’m giving you an added recipe called Grandma’s Crazy Salad!
Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mothers of all kinds!
Just Food 