If you can take a wild guess what this dish is I’ll give you a million dollars. If you can even tell me whether it’s a meat, vegetarian, or a fruit dish, whether it’s pie, bread, or some kind of meatloaf I’ll give you $10. But you need to come to England to collect it.
I know I’ve kept you in suspense long enough. This dish, according to the recipe I followed, is a rhubarb bread and butter pudding. M’s grandma gave me a huge bunch of rhubarb the last time we went for a visit and with only 2 days left to go before leaving the country for 2 weeks I knew I needed to do something with them FAST. She had recommended boiling them in sugar and just eating them like that but I wanted to get a little creative so I looked up a recipe. While I didn’t have the EXACT ingredients they called for I figured tiny adjustments and substitutions would be alright.
Except that it didn’t turn out to be alright…
Here is the original recipe:
This is how I strayed…
I started baking at 1AM because I wanted to bring in something nice to work and I knew we wouldn’t be able to finish off a whole loaf on our own.
I checked on my loaf 45 minutes after I’d put it in the oven, as the recipe called for. Imagine my surprise when I saw it was still a liquid mess. “That’s alright, just let it bake a little longer…at some point it will solidify” was my thinking. I think I left the loaf in the oven for double the amount of time as requested but when it came out, it came out looking BEAUTIFUL. Really! Fluffy, golden, and it smelled pretty decent as well. Even M wanted a bite of it. So at 3AM I went to bed feeling pretty satisfied and happy about the fact that I’d have something good to bring into work the next morning.
So just imagine the look of disappointment on my face when I saw that my lovely masterpiece had completely deflated overnight. When I went to pack up my dish to bring to work I found my loaf had completely fallen in and what had appeared to be golden the night before now just looked burnt.
To avoid any embarrassment I decided not to bring anything in to work. To punish myself I had the whole loaf for dinner, dessert that night and breakfast and dinner the next day. M played no part in helping me finish the loaf I refused to throw away…jerk.
Hmmm, RHUBARB!!!
I agree with Susan, it’s the effort that counts….did it taste decent?
Here’s my 2 cents on the substitutions:
– omitting those extra 3 slices of bread would definitely lead to a soggier final product, thus the need to double the baking time
– cream is significantly thicker than milk so you may need to have added some butter and maybe even some flour to thicken up the milk
– caster sugar is a much finer sugar…it’s used in baking because it is incorporated better and melts easier
– finally, butter beats margarine anytime
Are you surprised I know so much about sugar and dairy-products? It’s likely a result of being an only child and spending lots of time with my grandmother in the kitchen. No snails in my grandma’s kitchen though.
You need to at least somewhat-master one baked good and make it for us when you’re here (preferable dairy-free ;))
ASIDE: You’re back from Italy now?? Will you be around this weekend/week?
haha the taste met my standards…but I’ll eat anything if the alternative is to throw it away. We all know how much I hate to waste food! I don’t think it’s the WORST thing I’ve ever tasted but I wouldn’t say I was particularly proud of the final product…
I’ll work on the baking skills….but just as an FYI, I made rice krispy squares for my friends a couple months ago and even they turned out really soggy. The recipe called for some kind of milk glaze that I thought would taste really yummy. When I poured it on (maybe I poured on too much…) the whole thing turned into yet another soggy mess (surprise surprise!)
I’m still in Sardinia for the wknd..won’t be back til Sunday!
don’t judge a “loaf” by it’s cover??? LOL how did it taste? who cares what it looked like….. as long as it was good! i’m proud of you for trying out new things! one “pie” at a time
Wow, I’m pretty impressed with all the wittiness you packed into 2 sentences! Make sure you transfer those skills to your own blog when you start it up 😉