Butterscotch Sauce and Barbed Wire

Harvested my first batch of rhubarb yesterday. Not from the traumatised plants cowering behind the shed after they were brutally propagated over the winter months - I'm leaving those to recover and develop a good strong root system this year before I start amputating their stalks. These ones are from a patch at the other end of the plot that I will probably dig up and relocate next winter.

I followed a recipe by Denis Cotter from The Cafe Paradiso Cookbook for Rhubarb Shortbread with Butterscotch Sauce, which I've wanted to make since January, but rather than buying forced rhubarb from a supermarket, I've waited patiently till my own was ready to harvest.

Here's what I was trying to make (just take a moment to look at & admire that beautiful clear smooth & glossy butterscotch sauce):

And here is my effort:
Obviously you don't get to see the first batch of slightly burnt bitter tasting shortbread biscuits - I was totally engrossed in the new episode of Dr Who on TV so they were in the oven just a little too long. Those biscuits have been edited out of history and into the bin - but a 2nd tray that were on a lower shelf in the oven were fine.

Have to say it would've been perfect if it wasn't for the iffy butterscotch sauce. Followed the recipe very carefully, but as everyone knows, if you boil cream in a sauce (as I was instructed by Denis to do) it separates and goes all weird & splodgey.

Other than that, it was very delicious, so I might get the tippex & black biro out and modify Mr Cotter's book with a recipe for a butterscotch sauce I can work with, and try that one again.

Not a great deal of lottie action this week. I took a few days off work mid-week, & it's been warm & sunny for several weeks so the earth is hard as concrete - it's taking on that cracked crazed look that I remember really clearly from the long hot summer of 1976. Too hard to dig, so have just been watering stuff. But we've had a bit of rain in the night & this morning, so heading up there later on today.

But did get out and about on the Sussex Downs. Came across this near Wolstonbury Hill:
Do trees feel pain? My head tells me no, but my instinct & my heart very firmly say yes, they do. It wasn't just this one tree being slowly garrotted by barbed wire, there were a number along the side of the path. Poor things - if I'd had a set of pliers and some spare lengths of wire on me, I would've cut the wire & re-fixed the fence with a bit of give in it. Even if some landowner had come barrelling over the hill with a furious look and a 2-bore shot-gun pointed in my general direction.

But on a lighter note, the woodlands & hedgerows were looking utterly glorious & bursting into life after this long cold winter.


Just heavenly.

Masochistic Psychotic Rhubarb

Rhubarb likes to be treated badly. Really badly. Here you see my rhubarb bed - the small plant bottom left, is one that was already in situ. The other bigger plants, are all from one that I dug up back in November as it was in a prime sunny location which I needed for sun-hungry plants. I thought the rhubarb would do well in the shady spot behind the shed. Ahem. Well, ok, truth is, I thought it'd do alright there and couldn't think of anything else that'd be happy in a spot that only gets about 10 minutes of sunshine each day.

I carefully & studiously read up on what to do, and found out that it was good to dig up the crown, split it, and let the frost get to it before replanting.

And then I did something completely different.

Nowhere did I read the advice dig up the crown some time in late November as best you can (leaving some of the root behind probably) hack into a dozen pieces with a spade, leave out in an exposed place for 2 months of the coldest winter in 30 years, allowing it to be buried in snow twice. Then in early-Feb think "Oh heck - rhubarb pieces are still sitting out by the side of the shed - better try & plant it to see if it survives". Which is what I did - and just look at how jolly & perky it is! The one on the right gets a bit battered by the wind as it whips round the corner of the shed but I'll keep an eye on it & see how it gets on - may move that one again eventually. I bet it'll love it even better if I wait till the wind has snapped off ALL the stalks.

Rhubarb bed

Rhubarb now has it's own bed, in the shady spot behind the shed. Hopefully will do ok there - seems that not even the weeds flourish in that spot, as despite showing all the signs of several years neglect, it didn't take long to dig over. We treated the crowns appallingly - dug them up, chopped them into bits, and left them out to be battered by wind rain and frost, and buried under snow and ice throughout late Dec & early Jan. And still the pieces were getting busy budding & sprouting in a very hooliganish Ramsay-esque fashion. So instead of 2 huge crowns, we now have about a dozen plants (crownlets?). Four we gave away to a friend, six are in so far, still got a bit more digging to do before the final couple go in.

It's been the first weekend in several months that weather has been dry enough to allow us to spend both the Sat & Sun on the plot. I ache all over, and it feels wonderful.

Rhubarb

The rhubarb's sprouting and like the thuggish plant it is, is happily sprouting and growing away despite not being in the ground. There were several lots round the plot we took over - we dug the big crown up back in mid Dec while working our way digging over the plot and split into several pieces (have given some away) and left it out for frost to do it's work. But we've not yet dug over the space behind the shed where we want to move it. Must get that sorted out next weekend and get the rhubarb in.