Happy Sunday and happy spring to you all with three spring worthy vegan rhubarb recipes is what’s happening here today. Since we moved into our current house three years ago we’ve been loving the rhubarb plant growing in the veg patch that just keeps on giving. It’s lovely to see it pop up every spring, those strangley beautiful first knobbly pink pieces that break through the soil reminds me that warmth and growth and blooming is coming. It’s my favourite time of year. Which I say about almost any time while I’m in it, except deep into winter, haha!

When you watch the video and scroll down you’ll find two baking recipes and a chutney. A little bit of an eclectic mix but rhubarb lends itself well to many different things and among them these three. All the recipes have very different flavour profiles. The chutney is warming and sweet with chili and cardamom. The muffins have a caramel-y, coconut-y richness to them which oddly goes really well with the tarte rhubarb in my humble opinion. And finally the galette has a very clean flavour of rhubarb which lends itself really well to it’s sweet friend vanilla ice cream.

I really hope you’ll enjoy the video and these recipes and I look forward to seeing you here again next week with a new recipe! x


RHUBARB AND DATE CHUTNEY


Yields a 0,5 liter jar full.

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup apple cider vinegar

2 cups rhubarb, chopped into chunks

5 dates, pitted and roughly chopped

1 red onion, sliced into half moons

1 tbsp grated ginger

0,5 cup cane sugar or other sugar of your choice

0,25 tsp chilli flakes, or more if you like it hot

0,25 tsp ground cardamom

0,25 tsp sea salt

A few cracks of black pepper


METHOD:

Place all your ingredients in a sauce pan and bring to a boil. Then let cook and reduce until glossy and thickened to your preferred amount. This can take anywhere between 25-50 minutes over medium heat. Stir often and make sure it doesn’t catch. When done the rhubarb should have broken down and it should have thickened a fair amount. Refer to my video if you are not certain about the thickness.

When thickened leave to cool. Once cooled you can pour it into a jar and keep in the fridge for at least 10 days.



RHUBARB AND COCONUT MUFFINS


Find the recipe here!



RHUBARB GALETTE


Yields roughly 6 servings.

INGREDIENTS:

For the pastry:

1 cup buckwheat flour

0,75 cup almond flour

2 tbsp coconut or caster sugar

Pinch of salt

75 g vegan butter or margarine

2-4 tbsp ice water

For the filling:

4-5 long but quite slim rhubarb stalks,chopped on the diagonal into inch length pieces

1 tbsp coconut or caster sugar

1 tsp corn starch

Garnish the edge, optional:

0,5 tbsp olive or rapeseed oil

2 tbsp slivered almonds

Serve with:

Vegan vanilla ice cream


METHOD:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius.

Sift your buckwheat flour into a bowl and add your almond flour, 2 tbsp sugar and the salt into the same bowl. Give this a mix with a fork until well combined.

Cut your cold butter into shavings and add to the bowl (see video for my technique, you could also use a cheese slicer for this). Cut the butter into the flour using a pastry cutter or like me a fork. When more or less combined use your fingers to create a crumbly mix, don’t over work the pastry. Then add the ice water one tablespoon at a time until you can work the dough into a coherent ball. Only use as much water as is required for this action, leave the rest. Place the dough ball in the fridge will you prepare the filling. You can cover the pastry in cling film if you know you’ll leave it there a longer period of time so it doesn’t dry out.

Prepare your rhubarb and if you want the same pattern as I follow the instruction in the ingredients list. However, you can create any pattern you like or no pattern at all. Either way you will place your cut rhubarb into a bowl along with the starch and sugar. Give it a good mix to coat the rhubarb and set aside.

Time to roll out the pastry into a thin circle like shape. You’ll want to roll it out so that it’s no thicker than 3-4 mm. The easiest way to roll it out is by placing your pastry between two sheets of baking paper. You can then use your rolling pin to roll out the dough without it ever touching the pastry, preventing any sticking. Roll from different angles to flatten your ball. I suggest stopping once in a while and lifting the paper a little to remedy any cracks in the edges. I find these cracks are impossible to avoid but easy to fix with a gentle touch. When rolled out into the thin circle lift the top paper.

Place your rhubarb about an inch and a little bit from the side with the cut sides facing each other to create a v-shape. Continue doing this until your an inch and a little bit away from the other edge. The continue to match the pieces on the sides of your first v to create new vs on either side. Continue to do this until you have rhubarb an inch and a little bit away from every side of the pastry. You will need to cut your inch long pieces into smaller pieces as you go along to achieve this. Refer to the video for visuals.

When you have arranged your rhubarb it’s time to fold the pastry over the edge. For this you’ll want to lift the baking paper to help fold the edges over the fruit. Little by little you can fold it over and gently press down before pulling the sheet off of the astry. Continue until you’ve folded in all the edges.

You could now bake the galette as is but if you wan to get extra fancy you can brush the folded over edges with a little oil and then sprinkle it with slivered almonds. This is a beautiful effect and gives a nice nutty crunch to the finished result.

Then slide your baking sheet onto a baking tray and bake in the centre of the oven for 30 minutes. Once baked remove from the oven and let cool for a minute or two before slicing and serving with some vegan vanilla ice cream.